I thought he was dead. No, seriously, I REALLY thought he was dead. So when I got a new CD from one of the great pioneers of psychedelic rock, I thought “oh, here comes the vault releases.” But upon closer inspection, I realized this was an album of NEW MUSIC from Roky Erickson, the madman that was behind the music of the 13th Floor Elevators, simply one of the most insane of all the early psychedelic bands of the ‘60s.

As the Elevators gained popularity, so did their notoriety, as police everywhere took exception to their very public use and public support of LSD and marijuana. Erickson was arrested for one lone joint in 1969, and pleaded insanity to escape a prison term. He spent three and a half years in a hospital for the criminally insane, where he was diagnosed as a schizophrenic and subjected to shock treatments and heavy thorazine therapy.

He was never quite the same, and for the next two decades was in and out of various mental institutions, even signing an affidavit in 1982 that a martian had taken residence in his body.

In 1990, artists like R.E.M., ZZ Top, and Jesus & Mary Chain contributed to a tribute album, which brought his music to a much wider audience, leading to his first live appearance in decades at the “Austin Music Awards” in 1993. This was the beginning of a long, slow recovery which eventually led to his new album, “True Love Cast Out All Evil,” a brilliant album of original songs produced by Will Sheff of Okkervil River and featuring the band as his backup.

The album opens with “Devotional Number,” that is produced as it may have been in 1965, which segues into “Ain’t Blues Too Sad,” bringing us into the 21st century production. What follows is classic Erickson, great songs, deep lyrics, and one hell of a comeback album. The album closes with another ‘60s-style production called “God Is Everywhere,” that wonderfully bookends this amazing record, and re-establishes Roky Erickson as the genius many have claimed him to be for decades.

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