10 Perfect Rock Songs That Changed Music History

There was always a bit of an unspoken rule regarding hard rock and hip hop throughout most of the '80s. While there had been crossovers like Anthrax and Public Enemy on Bring the Noise or even Aerosmith teaming up with Run-DMC, these were always two separate genres that fell on totally opposite sides of the musical spectrum. There was a lot more in common once you looked for it though, and when you have enough anger in your soul, both rap and rock start to blend together.

Taking an almost punk aesthetic to their sound, Killing in the Name was the first time most of us got to hear hip hop infused with rock in a neat package, with Tom Morello's hard as nails riffs being offset by Zack de La Rocha's pointed lyrics, pointing the finger at crooked cops who are exploiting people of color for racist purposes. It may have had metal's aggression, but there was always a trail leading back to rap as well, almost like if Cypress Hill decided to form a band with the members of Led Zeppelin.

Without even knowing it, Rage had created a whole new genre of music, with nu metal rising soon afterwards, taking all of the aggression and pairing it with lyrics that had to do with inner torment, either regarding abuse they were suffering with or more frat boy stuff like Limp Bizkit's Break Stuff. Nu metal may have gotten a bit of a nasty reputation in the past few years, but you couldn't deny the real anger going on when this song was first unleashed.