Music fans are taught not to expect too much from the drummer.

Although certainly talented and gifted with a particular set of skills possessed by few, the drummer, when stripped of sticks and cymbals, isn't expected to make music of much merit.

There are exceptions. Dave Grohl's post-Nirvana career is now every bit as successful as when he invigorated grunge with his big beats. Phil Collins certainly found success, and while some of his later solo works err on the side of saccharine, there were a couple of great tunes produced. What can I say, I'm still a sucker for Against All Odds .

But they all pale in comparison with the late, great and shamefully under-regarded Dennis Wilson.

For years, Wilson, who drowned in 1983, lived in the long shadow cast by big brother Brian, the mastermind behind their band, the Beach Boys. Content to fill the role of California handsome party boy, Dennis Wilson was better known for the image he lent the Beach Boys than for his musical contributions. Then, in 1977, during a lull in the Beach Boys story, he entered a California studio and produced one of the loveliest, most lyrical and heartbreaking records ever forgotten, Pacific Ocean Blue .

It was a low-key affair that hinged on the gruff timbre of Dennis Wilson's voice, his way with a chord progression and arrangements designed not to impress, but serve the song.

Sadly, Pacific Ocean Blue has long been unavailable, surfacing only briefly on CD in 1991. Sony/Legacy has re-released Pacific along with a selection of unreleased tracks intended for Bambu , a never-completed follow-up.

The disc is clearly influenced by many of the ideas popular in California at the time. There's the same melancholic love songs the Eagles attempted with far less success. There's an affection for the natural world and a sense of dismay at confusion and complexity of a society that refuses to stop and admire its wonders.

The centerpiece is a trio of tunes that showcase Wilson's ability to communicate authentic, and sometimes uncomfortable, emotion through song. Thoughts of You, Time and You and I are linked by subject matter -- the slippery nature of love -- with only You and I feeling at all optimistic. But each exhibits a sense of mellow confidence in both the material and message. They are the perfect foundation from which the sprawl of the Pacific reissue can operate. They are the template that the other 30 (it's a generous record) build off of.

The Bambu tracks don't hold up quite as well as the Pacific songs. It's unclear what was intended with them and the cohesiveness on Pacific is absent. Still, there are high points, including Love Remember Me and Holy Man, an unfinished track that Foo Fighter drummer Taylor Hawkins lends his own gruff vocal to.

It's amazing that a record as engaging as Pacific Ocean Blue could vanish for so many years, particularly given Dennis Wilson's tragic fate and connection to the legendary Beach Boys. Fortunately, it has been rectified and the world can, once again, give it up for the drummer.