He´d only recently stolen the show at the Monterey Pop Festival, winning the hearts and minds of the white hippie audience; he´d just recorded "Sittin´ on the Dock of the Bay," now and forever one of soul´s all-time greatest moments. And then he died in that horrible plan crash. The Immortal Otis Redding was the first posthumous release following Redding´s tragic death, and it reveals the interesting direction Redding was taking in the studio during the last six weeks of his life. Produced by legendary Stax guitarist Steve Cropper, Redding often seems headed in a direction here primed for the funk of the future, although he never had the chance to put his final imprint on it. Ironically, nothing on this disc became a pop or R&B hit in the wake of "Dock of the Bay," although any number of tunes certainly qualify for that status. It may have been a case of too much, too soon. Not until two decades later did the Black Crowes´ hit cov