Bush - Sixteen Stone (1994)

[Post-Grunge Rock]

In 1994 Bush took a lot of unnecessary criticism for apparently being a Nirvana clone. To be fair, in 1994 - every band was Nirvana clone. With Sixteen Stone they took the angst of grunge and wrapped it up in a big ball of English optimism, and made a dirty distorted sound that was very much their own. Whereas Kurt Cobain was all about telling us how shit his world was, Gavin Rossdale wrote more positive lyrics, and their big hooky choruses left you feeling good about things. Songs like 'Everything Zen' and 'Little Things' had a alt-rock crunch, but they were still radio friendly enough to get plenty of airplay, and how could 'Glycerine' not become a classic ballad of the 90s (even though no one has any idea what it is about)?. It isn't a perfect album by any means, and there a couple of low spots ('Bomb' is a mess), but for the most part this is one of the best debuts of the post-grunge 90s. It's a shame Bush never made an album this good again.