10 Most Important Hard Rock Bands Of The 80s
1. Guns N Roses
After less than a decade under its belt, hair metal was really starting to get played out. Just like the original glam rock that had come before it, there were only so many bands that put hairspray and lipstick on to go around before people started to get burned out on the whole thing. We needed something a lot more real and honest, and it turned out that we didn't need to look very far either.
Coming right in the middle of the Sunset Strip, Guns N Roses were the exact antithesis to the radio friendly styles of hair metal, having songs that fit just as well in metal, punk, and straight up rock and roll. At a time when everyone was trying to go for the power ballads, you had someone like Slash taking pages from Joe Perry's and Eric Clapton's playbook, with leads that lodged themselves into your brain the moment that you heard them.
While this might have been one of the biggest bands of the '80s, Guns also felt like the end of an era for the sounds of Sunset as well. Being able to survive and thrive in the next decade, the swagger of GNR was the kind of rock and roll that could never be matched by anything hair metal could dish out. Forget Nirvana...this was the real death knell for the Sunset Strip. Other bands may have been popular around the same time, but why the hell would you settle with the poodle haired wannabes when you have someone like Guns out in the world?