10 Greatest Punk Bands Of All Time

For as much as punk is about the fundamentals of rock music, the genre did have its fair share of diversity amongst its groups. As everyone started to venture past just power chords, other new offshoots like new wave and post-punk kept the punk mentality moving forward. Emerging just at the tail end of the punk movement, Sonic Youth took everything their predecessors did and then applied it to their art.

Across albums like Daydream Nation and Goo, the band threw caution to the wind and made whatever music suited the song, which involved everything from inventing drone-like tunings to some of the fuzziest guitar tones you've ever heard. Armed with Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo, Sonic Youth created some of the most awe-inspiring guitar trade-offs in the entire genre on songs like "Teen Age Riot" and "Kool Thing." The sound could vary between a barrage of chaos or a pretty melodic section, but everything always held together as a cosmic ball of noise.

The band even had an influence on the shape of rock to come, with bassist/vocalist Kim Gordon encouraging their label to go after a little fledgeling band from the Northwest called Nirvana. Sonic Youth might not be put on a pedestal like other bands of their ilk, but there is no disputing how much musical ground they were able to cover.