Blind Melon: Nico

It's amazing how death can propel a sinking career to mythic status: When singer Shannon Hoon died of a cocaine overdose on his tour bus last year, Blind Melon's sophomore album Soup was plummeting off the sales charts, and the band's smash hit "No Rain" was fading in America's cultural memory. It didn't help that Soup was a muddled, confused, unwieldy, critically panned mess: It's not out of line to suggest that Blind Melon wouldn't have recorded another major-label album had Hoon survived to make it. Instead, we get this high-profile post-mortem, which features stripped-down alternate takes, outtakes and studio sessions from throughout the band's five-year existence. (Who saw Soup: The Outtakes coming) But what's amazing about Nico is that it's the band's best album: It's more cohesive, the performances are more subtle, and it's not as precious or rambling as either of its two predecessors. It doesn't hurt that irony adds layers of depth to songs about death and drugs and goodbyes; few phenomena in song are as profound as a singer unknowingly foretelling his own demise. There are bands with richer legacies than Blind Melon's, but Nico is a worthy epitaph anyway.