10 Rock Albums That You MUST Listen To In Full
5. Appetite for Destruction - Guns N Roses
The hair metal scene of the '80s pretty much died an ugly death at the end of the decade. For every good band coming down the pipeline, there were other singles like Warrant's Cherry Pie that made the entire genre feel like it jumped the shark. No, if you wanted to see what real rock and roll looked like, you went to Guns N Roses.
As opposed to just throwing together a bunch of songs that related to the same thing, there's almost a story playing out over the tracks on Appetite for Destruction. From start to finish, all of the lyrics and riffs read like the diary of these five men as they try to live the life of excess just off of the Strip. Across songs like It's So Easy and Mr. Brownstone, you can tell that these guys are almost trapped in their own sleazy lives, knowing nothing else other than sex, drugs, and rock and roll.
The tail end is where the depth comes in though, with songs like Sweet Child O Mine and the eventual closer Rocket Queen showing the heart behind the rough exterior, with Slash coming through with the most essential licks of the decade. There's nothing wrong with the hair metal of old respectively, but once you got a helping of this, why the hell would you want the watered-down version?