Listen to a Demo of ‘My Sweet Lord’ from George Harrison’s ‘Early Takes: Volume 1′

'Early Takes: Volume 1,' a collection of raw, mostly acoustic demos from the start of George Harrison's solo career, will be released next month, with fans treated to early takes of some of Harrison's most celebrated songs and many others.

The disc focuses on the time period in 1970 before the youngest Beatle dropped his first solo album, the smash 'All Things Must Pass,' with demos of 'My Sweet Lord,' 'Awaiting On You All,' 'Behind That Locked Door,' 'Run Of The Mill' and Harrison's collaboration with Bob Dylan, 'I'd Have You Anytime,' included.

In addition, you'll hear demos of Harrison's songs 'Woman Don't You Cry For Me' and 'The Light That Has Lighted The World' as well as his take on Dylan's 'Mama You've Been On My Mind' and the Everly Brothers' 'Let It Be Me.'

The collection was co-produced by George's widow Olivia and Giles Martin (son of famed Beatles producer George Martin), who told the Chicago Tribune, "There is something different about a take that wasn't designed to be the master take that has an excitement about it."

"When you think about 'My Sweet Lord' or 'All Things Must Pass,' that was the first time [Harrison] was playing those songs with a band," he added. "It was just a three-piece band, but you get an energy that doesn't come when things are more considered down the line. It's like falling in love for the first time. You can't duplicate that in subsequent takes."

The May 1 release of 'Early Takes: Volume 1' will accompany the DVD and Blu-Ray release of Martin Scorsese’s acclaimed 2011 Harrison documentary, 'Living in the Material World.' The CD will be sold in both stand-alone versions and in a deluxe edition that will come bundled with a copy of the film.

And while the demo below of 'My Sweet Lord' is pretty amazing, we're big fans of the finished version, too -- it came in at No. 56 in our current countdown of the Top 100 Classic Rock Songs.

Listen to George Harrison's Demo of 'My Sweet Lord'