By Nina Simone, 1998

With characteristic willfulness, Nina Simone plunged into a range of songbooks and styles between 1966 and 1973, when she recorded nine LPs for RCA. This two-disc overview demonstrates just how unpredictable and headstrong the seething songstress was during a period that was tumultuous for Simone personally and for society in general. Top 40 covers ("Mr.

Bojangles," "To Love Somebody") mix with rock (Dylan's "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues," George Harrison's "Here Comes the Sun") and pop standards ("Since I Fell for You," "My Man's Gone Now"). An increasingly politicized perspective informed Simone's late-'60s work. Her friends included Black Power firebrands H.

Rap Brown and Stokely Carmichael, and she made no attempt to disguise her militancy. "The King of Peace is dead. I ain't about to be nonviolent, honey!" she announces on this collection's "Martin Luther King Suite," which was recorded live one day after the civil rights leader's assassination.

While a number of selections included here can also be found on RCA's two volumes of Essentials, this lovingly assembled survey (which includes five previously unreleased recordings) captures the High Priestess of Soul in all her unshackled glory. --Steven Stolder

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