If Elliott Smith [ tickets ]'s "From a Basement on the Hill"--a work-in-progress that was rescued by friends and family following his death a year ago--is any indication, he had a great deal left to offer. The tragedy is that now we can only guess about the music he'll never create.

Much could be made about the lyrics and song titles that hint at depression, drug use and thoughts of death ("She had a dream, woke up in shock/She had seen her own body outlined in chalk")--words Smith wrote so soon before purportedly taking his own life.

But if we can get past being closet psychoanalysts and just listen to the music, there is a lot to go on: The opening rocker "Coast to Coast," which combines radio voices, piano and grungy guitar; the bluesy duo of "Don't Get Down" into "Strung Out Again"; and a mood that goes from playful ("I met a girl/Snowball in hell/She was hard and cracked as the Liberty Bell"), to bittersweet ("She's a sight to see/She's good to me/But I'm already somebody's baby"), to the political "A Distorted Reality is Now a Necessity to be Free."

Many songs still echo late Beatles, but at this point in his career, Smith had infused all that "Abbey Road" guitar, drumming and layered harmonies into his own sound, adding lyrics only he could create.

It's hard to know what he left his producers--namely Rob Schnapf and Joanne Bolme--to work with, but it's clear they did him justice. It is, no matter what he last heard of it, an Elliott Smith album: full of addictive melodies, and words mixed with regret and hope, immediacy and waiting for something more.