10 Best Hard Rock Ballads

10. Aftermath - Muse

After a few album's of sonic experimentation, Muse's 2015 release Drones focused on the band getting back to basics as a lean, mean, rock power trio. From the aggro stomp of "Psycho" to the mix of electronic and hard rock on "Dead Inside," the album was an absolute scorcher across every track. However, the band had a few more tricks up their sleeve for the end.

Opening with a moody guitar passage, "Aftermath" is the perfect image of world-weary beauty as the narrator longs for the comfort of his love one. With the album centered around a post-apocalyptic world overtaken by drone strikes, this song sounds like a man walking through the wasteland, surveying the carnage that has unfolded before him.

The chorus of the song brings a sense of hope that even though things look grim around our protagonist, at least he has his love with him to survive and thrive into the future. Even if the struggle back to stability will not be easy, at least there is someone there so it is not such a lonesome journey. In an album drenched in bleak darkness, "Aftermath" is the musical flower rising through the concrete.