10 Albums That Changed The Face Of Rock Music

Almost 30 years ago, a little known underground band from Seattle, Washington, single handily took down the biggest rock trend of the '80s. After grunge, hair metal, with all its Lothario posturing, felt like an embarrassing hangover. Grunge music was the new trend, and with it came a rejection of commercialism and an acknowledgement of real emotion.

It was the sound of rebellious honesty. If you connected with grunge it's because you were in pain or pissed off, and you were sick of pretending otherwise. Nirvana's debut, Bleach, was a hard hitting record blending metal and punk rock. Nevermind was even more powerful, blending far more melody into all the raging textures of distortion.

In the 30 years since its release there hasn't been an album that represented such a shift in musical tone. In the mid '90s, Oasis and Blur both helped to rekindle the love of '80s indie - while harking back to the first Summer of Love - but they were sounds we'd heard before. The 2000s was only a continuation of this trend, grunge was the last truly unique rock genre, and Nevermind was its flaming beacon.