10 '60s Hard Rock Albums You Need To Listen To

2. The Stooges - The Stooges

Out of all the bands on this list so far, there was always a certain amount of class that came with listening to their records. Regardless of how abrasive some of them sounded, you can tell that the band put genuine thought into the arrangements and were designed to sound the way they were. When it comes to the Stooges, it feels like their entire first album was a wild experiment that somehow worked.

Inspired by the heavier rock they were hearing at the time, these transplants out of Detroit were the first to make rock and roll that actually sounded dangerous. This wasn't just a song here and there that sounded like it had some dark undercurrent to it. From the griminess of I Wanna Be Your Dog to the brashness of 1969, every single riff on this record feels like it's meant to beat you over the head from the minute it comes on.

That's before you even get to Iggy Pop, who lives up to his wild man persona on record, going from brooding on the dark meditation We Will Fall to sounding like he's on the verge of a mental breakdown on pretty much all of the rest of the record. While the Beatles may have been the ones to open your minds to what music could do, the Stooges were the kind of music that could rattle something inside your soul. It's a little bit off putting, but it's the kind of musical trainwreck that you can't turn away from.