Top 10 for 1991

TheBigBlack's Rock Top 10

Lenny Kravitz
Mama Said

Rock | Album | 2 April 1991

Screaming Trees
Uncle Anesthesia

Grunge Rock | Album | 29 January 1991

U2
Achtung Baby

Rock | Album | 19 November 1991

U2 had been slowing climbing to success for a number of years, and the recent studio & live combo album Rattle & Hum had positioned them at the top of the pack for the new decade. Their music now oozed with Americana charm, and it seemed obvious what would come next - and this is why the music world was left stunned when the first single 'The Fly' hit the airwaves. Reinvention is common in bands, but reinvention is about stripping back to the basic parts and rebuilding. This new U2 felt like none of those basic parts had ever existed. That first single, and the album that followed, was light years from anything the band had done before - and just about as far from anything else being played on the radio at the time. Be it by expert design or by total fluke, Achtung Baby positioned U2 at the forefront of the alternative movement that was about to flood the airwaves. The album sampled songs and sounds, it compressed and altered the instruments, it used odd song timings and arrangements, and Bono used his voice in ways he never had before. 'Zoo Station' bolts from its pen, its brazen overwrought guitar signalling like a warning of what is to come, and even mega hits like 'One' are produced to within an inch of their lives, deliberately removing any trace of the band that existed in the 1980s. 'Mysterious Ways' is so groovy you just need to move with it, and that is what makes the soul of the album - building a set of songs that regardless of how many overdubs are put on them, you can still hear the greatness of the tunes beneath it all. The Edge truly shines here, with tracks like 'Ultra Violet (Light My Way)' really showing his versatility. The album ends with some sombre moments, closing with 'Acrobat' and 'Love Is Blindness', ending a damn near perfect album.

Soundgarden
Badmotorfinger

Grunge Rock | Album | 8 October 1991

Smashing Pumpkins
Gish

Alternative Rock | Album | 28 April 1991

Motorhead
1916

Hard Rock | Album | 26 February 1991

Nirvana
Nevermind

Grunge Rock | Album | 24 September 1991

Guns n' Roses
Use Your Illusion I

Hard Rock | Album | 17 September 1991

Guns n' Roses
Use Your Illusion II

Hard Rock | Album | 17 September 1991

Pearl Jam
Ten

Grunge Rock | Album | 27 August 1991

TheBigBlack's Rock Honourable Mentions

Bob Dylan
The Bootleg Series Vols. 1-3, Rare & Unreleased (1961-1991)

Classic Rock | Compilation Boxed Set | 26 March 1991

TheBigBlack's Metal Top 10

Cannibal Corpse
Butchered At Birth

Death Metal | Album | 1 July 1991

Carcass
Necroticism, Descanting The Insalubrious

Death Metal (Grindcore) | Album | 30 October 1991

Darkthrone
Soulside Journey

Black Metal | Album | 13 January 1991

Death
Human

Death Metal | Album | 22 October 1991

Ozzy Osbourne
No More Tears

Heavy Metal | Album | 17 September 1991

Sepultura
Arise

Thrash Metal | Album | 20 March 1991

Metallica
Metallica

Thrash Metal | Album | 12 August 1991