Top 10 Alt Rock Albums for Beginners

1. Nirvana - Nevermind

The 1994 album that started it all -- on the radio, at least. Get grungy with Cobain's throat-tearing delivery of a decade's worth of Seattle rain.

2. Radiohead - OK Computer

View Full-Size In 2005, Spin magazine called OK Computer "the top album of the past 20 years." In 1998, my high school friends called it "the best album to listen to on your disc-man while looking at the stars and thinking wistfully about girls." I think you'll see they were both right. Buy Direct

3. The Pixies - Doolittle

At the time Frank Black was belting this collection of wrenching ditties, the music world didn't care much. But hindsight is 20/20; you have no excuse. These songs are the jaunty, crunchy, confusing, passionate vertebrae that make up the back-bone of Alternative Rock.

4. The Smiths - The Queen Is Dead

Alt Rock fans are supposed to be navel-gazing, introverted and pissed-off. No one is more these things than the Smith's lead-singer, Morrissey. Luckily, he's also frighteningly witty, melodically gifted and backed by one of the '80s most refreshing and (in their day) original bands.

5. U2 - Joshua Tree

So there's this band. You may have heard of them (even if you've been hiding under a rug for 25 years listening exclusively to Tibetan Chant.) According to Rolling Stone, Joshua Tree is one of U2's "three masterpieces." Not many bands have three masterpieces -- let alone one.

6. Pearl Jam - Ten

Though the album begins "I admit it. What's to say?" Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder was able to find a lot of words to explore Alt Rock's favorite Grunge-era themes: suicide, depression, loneliness. How can so much misery be so damn enjoyable? Marvel at the genius of Alternative Rock.

7. The Replacements - Let It Be

These guys were mixing punk rock energy with bluesy-guitar drunkness in order to express their discontent for life long before such practises made men into millionaires. This album got them a major label deal -- and eventually inspired a few hundred thousand pimply-faced teenagers to form bands.

8. Bjork - Debut

If ever Alternative Rock was truly alternative, it was with Bjork. She'll freak you out in the best possibly way. Listen to it. My words will never do it justice.

9. R.E.M. - Murmur

The infectious melodies and jangly guitars that launched Murmur from the dials of "college radio" to Late Night with David Letterman and the Billboard Top 30 are the reason Alternative Rock eventually took over all the other mediums, TV shows and radio dials.

10. Violent Femmes - Violent Femmes

In 1982 the Violent Femmes recorded their self-titled debut album. Ten years later the album went platinum. Do you need more evidence of the timelessness and importance of this Alt Rock classic? (Hint: no.)