It's why Smith's songs continue to profoundly affect and influence new generations of songwriters, like Phoebe Bridgers, Jessica Lea Mayfield, Seth Avett, Snail Mail's Lindsey Jordan, Julien Baker, and Francis Lung. He became the muse for those afflicted with a similar internal grief, understanding what compels humans to persist in the bleakest of times. The survivor of a challenging childhood (shadowy hints abound on 'Waltz #2 (XO)') and shuttled between parents, he understood not only the nuances and layers of his own pain, but the universality of those storms of the soul. Buoyant-sounding tracks like 'Baby Britain' or 'Ballad of Big Nothing' showed off his catchy and crafty pop ear.

Smith loved Elvis Costello and he reached for more ornate pop arrangments, acknowledging that debt to his influence, on later albums, like XO and Either/Or. Dusty slants of sunshine and errant murmurs of romanticism drifted through Smith's songs, between the raindrops. His lyrics could teeter towards excruciating self-loathing, but there were hopeful, punchy corners and unexpected turns. Elliott Smith, 'Between the Bars,' Either/Or (1997) The potential you'll be that you'll never see With the things you could do, you won't but you might He sang about that self-immolation bluntly in the unforgiving ' Needle in the Hay,' from Elliot Smith, and the gorgeously brutal 'Between the Bars,' found on Either/Or, acknowledging that chaos in his life. Some days were far harder than others, lost in a haze of booze or heroin his second solo album, 1995's Elliott Smith, was flecked with references to the latter. He was an intuitive messenger with an eye on on the psychological, spiritual and philosphical pitfalls of making it through a day. His drive to write songs, to wade into that intangible despair and try to make sense of it, was Smith's most resilient way forward for a long time. But what Smith achieved while struggling with a devastating illness and dependency is remarkable.

He might always be viewed through a tragic prism in rock 'n' roll - a young musician who did not survive his crippling depression, passing away in 2003 at the age of 34 by what was inconclusively determined as suicide. Elliott Smith, who forged his haunted whispers and delicate guitar fingerpicking into astonishingly intimate songs, wrestled with melancholia and dependency on drugs and alcohol throughout much of his short life.

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