For the Best of Us
John Doe's 2005 albumForever Hasn't Happened Yetranked among his best work, both as a solo performer and with '80s punk linchpins, X. And for the follow-up, the Los Angeles crooner has reissued a long-lost treasure: the 1998 EPFor the Rest of Us, which he has rechristened with a supplementary five songs taken from the same recording sessions. Ever autonomous and venturesome, Doe backed up "A Step Outside" and "Let's Get Lost" with then-members of Beck's backing band, before propelling into the soul of the album: the self-deprecating "Unhappy Song," the raggedly satisfying "Bad Bad Feeling," and "This Loving Thing," cowritten with Foo Fighter Dave Grohl. The five extra tracks include the Woody Guthrie cover "Vigilante Man," and "Criminal," where Doe's voice--one of rock music's best--tells of the forlorn and those who catch them. And only Exene Cervenka is absent from the rabid "Come Home," which plays more like a leftover fromWild Giftthan any solo session.--Scott Holter