10 Best Experimental Rock Albums Of All Time

10. The Downward Spiral - Nine Inch Nails

By the time we reached the '90s, most of the rock crowd had developed a pretty high tolerance for weird stuff. Since this was the era that had brought us stuff like Primus and the zanier side of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, we'd pretty much hit the ceiling on something strange getting on the charts, right? Turns out that Trent Reznor heard that and raised you one better will a slow slide into Hell on The Downward Spiral.

Throughout this entire album, there's pretty much nothing that could be called a 'ready for radio' single. Over half of the record feels like dark ambience, and the parts that do have singing have a lot of off putting moments that you wouldn't necessarily hear on a Rolling Stones record or anything. It takes a lot to make something this off the wall, let alone something that was able to relate with so many people across the world.

Even though the tale of Mr. Self Destruct is absolutely heartbreaking from start to finish, there's a little bit of humanity that you see poking through the cracks, almost as if Trent is trying to find a way to purge himself of his demons by making these songs. The scars might last you a lifetime, but that doesn't mean the hurt has to stay with you the rest of your days.