When MusiCares honored Bob Dylan a few years back, Bob had some rather kind things to say about Kris Kristofferson. “Everything was very copacetic. Everything was all right until – until – Kristofferson came to town. Oh, they ain't seen anybody like him. He came into town like a wildcat that he was, flew a helicopter into Johnny Cash's backyard, not your typical songwriter. And he went for the throat. ‘Sunday Morning Coming Down.’ … You can look at Nashville pre-Kris and post-Kris, because he changed everything.”

That epic transformation will be apparent in Sony Legacy’s 16-disc set celebrating Kristofferson’s 80th birthday, The Complete Monument & Columbia Album Collection. The set, coming out 6/10, includes 11 studio albums recorded from 1970 through 1981, five discs of unreleased and hard-to-find live and studio material drawn, three concert recordings from 1970-1972 including his 1970 Big Sur Folk Festival show and two discs of rarities featuring non-LP singles, studio outtakes and previously unavailable demos.

The period Dylan talks about was when Kristofferson, who worked as a janitor and oil rig worker and was a Rhodes’ scholar, was penning songs that would become hits for others—"Me and Bobby McGee," "For the Good Times," "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down," "Help Me Make It Through the Night" and others. Allmusic.com wrote about his first album in a way that could cover his entire recorded output: “He brought a conviction to his vocals and a complete understanding of the nuances of the lyrics. The songs were so personal that they seemed to demand a personal interpretation, and established the persona of a poor songwriter struggling against despair.”

Beyond everything packaged as it was originally released, the set includes a booklet with essays from Monument founder Fred Foster, Don Was and Mikal Gilmore.