10 Best Alternative Rock Bands Of The 1980s

A lot of people tend to forget how much of the early alternative scene was indebted to the old school of rock and roll. As much as this might have seemed like a new and inventive sound back in the day, the sound of jangly guitars from the indie scene sounded a lot closer to the Byrds from the '60s than anything bold and experimental. If you take a little bit from your heroes here and there though, sometimes you find out who you are by accident.

Around the same time that bands like New Order were coming up the ranks, the Smiths never really fit neatly into any particular genre. Though Johnny Marr could play his guitar like it was second nature to him, the esoteric lyrics of Morrissey was definitely a change of pace, putting together something that was a lot more sophisticated than someone like Kajagoogoo. Across albums like Meat is Murder and The Queen is Dead, you can hear the band really pushing to make their sound bigger, as the lyrics get more and more lovelorn on songs like There is a Light That Never Goes Out.

Compared to the bands that screamed alt rock from the very beginning, this is kind of pop-focused indie rock that had just a little bit of a dark edge to it. By no means would you call something like this edgy, but you'd have to look long and hard to find another band that could squeeze as much as emotion into a song as they could.