10 Perfect Debut Rock Albums Of The 90s

As much as people like to talk about alternative rock killing off hair metal, the grunge wave wasn't all that kind to other types of metal either. Though you did have bands like Pantera making a name for themselves, some of the heavy hitters like Megadeth and Metallica were about to enter some of the rougher patches in their career around this time. Just when metal started to wane, we got something truly disturbing out of California with Korn's debut.

Compared to the other metal that was going on around this time, Korn was a bit of an oddity, tuning their guitars down to unheard of levels and having Jonathan Davis' extremely candid lyrics about abuse and pain. And at this point can we really call what he does singing? There might be a certain cadence to some lines, but the way Davis articulates feels more suited to rap than anything else.

Little did we all know that this would become the genesis of nu metal in the coming years. Instead of rappers and rockers interacting like Public Enemy and Anthrax, here was a band that had their own thing and making some of the heaviest music imaginable by laying their soul down on record. The '80s metal scene may have been about being kings of the universe, but this is where the raw humanity starts to come into play.