10 Severely Underrated Grunge Albums

1. Babes In Toyland - Spanking Machine

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMmnO34saOQ It's hard to figure out just why some of the female fronted bands of the grunge scene didn't attain the same stardom that followed that of their males counterparts, especially when listening to one of grunge's fiercest and most genuine exports, the venomous vixens, Babes In Toyland. These girls played with more balls than a lot of the male grungers of the day, and no album was noisier than the ugly beauty, Spanking Machine. It is emotionally raw and even more musically so, thanks to the shambolic instrument playing prodding vocalist Kat Bjelland into insane levels of vocal uneasiness. Her skin peeling performance throughout Spanking Machine is on the precipice of the great leading female vocalists in music. She yelps, screams, howls and screeches with unprecedented ease over songs like the bruising 'He's My Thing' or the defiant bipolar steamroller 'Lashes'. Her voice tears holes into an already punctured musical landscape, projecting shrapnel against the cold, clanging fretwork. The album's unevenness only helps to enhance the emotionally scarred themes like on the plodding blues of 'Dogg' or on the discordant aggression of 'Pain In The Heart', the latter of which being a particular glistening high-point among a slew of fragmented crackers. But really this feels like a proper album from start to finish, making it one that best benefits from a full length play to best reap its jagged rewards. In terms of sheer fragility and open lyrical autonomy, Spanking Machine hits all the open wounds with effortless surgical precision without batting any doll-like eyelids in the process. Truly brilliant. What are the most underrated grunge albums that deserve more exposure? Let us know in the comments!