Top 100 Alternative Rock Songs Now

By: The Sonic Vault

The bass line alone belongs in a museum. The crescendoing "We have two hundred couches..." outro is the sound of NYC post-punk revival at its most anthemic. TOP 100 ALTERNATIVE ROCK SONGS

The slacker manifesto. The conversation at the beginning. The sudden explosion of distortion. Weezer made nerdiness cool. By: The Sonic Vault The bass line alone

Defining "Alternative Rock" has always been a paradox. It was a genre born from the refusal to be defined. In the 1980s, it was the scrappy, noisy resistance to the synth-laden excesses of mainstream pop and hair metal. In the 1990s, it shockingly became the mainstream. By the 2000s, it had fractured into a thousand shards—post-punk revival, garage rock, emo, and indie sleaze. The conversation at the beginning

The heaviest song on this list. The Melvins are your favorite band's favorite band. This sludge-fest is the primordial ooze from which Nirvana crawled.