The booming 90s alt-rock era was a great time to be alive. Alongside grunge, the genre was flourishing, with some of the best albums of the decade being rock records with some edge and grit to them.
Once we moved into the 2000s, it was tough for some of the bands to maintain their stride, so a lot of them fell off. That sucks.
However, some of those great alt-rock bands kept the heat on and still sound just as good today as they did in their prime. Scroll down to see a few we think really kept the heat on.
Candlebox
In 1993, Candlebox came out swinging with their self-titled debut album. The record featured a couple of major singles—”You” and “Far Behind”—and has since become a staple of the grunge era.
Over the next few years, Candlebox dropped a couple more killer records before taking a bit of a break. They rebounded in the late 2000s and maintained a solid alt-rock career for the next couple of decades.
Then, in 2023, the band released what was supposed to be their final album, The Long Goodbye. It is, hands down, one of their best records. I’d put it in their top 3, easy. For a band that launched 30 years prior, it’s deeply impressive to hear that they can still pull off high-quality alt-rock/grunge jams.
Everclear
Everclear broke into the mainstream in the early-mid 90s, with a series of alt-rock albums that were, for lack of a more proper term, f***ing amazing. Seriously, go look at their discography and tell me that they didn’t have an iconic 10-year run at the start.
It doesn’t stop there, though. While Art Alexakis and the boys haven’t put out an album since 2015 (Black Is the New Black, and it too is phenomenal), they haven’t stopped or slowed down. I’ve seen them live like three times in the past five years, and they have delivered every time. Every. Single. Time.
Hell, check out the tune “Year of the Tiger” from 2022. The fact that Everclear cranked that out roughly three decades after putting out their first songs is insane. It’s the same high-energy, confrontational rock ‘n’ roll that put them on the map.
Foo Fighters
Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters have never really missed, in my opinion. Have some of their albums been a tad less moving than others? Sure. That’s unavoidable for a band with a 30+ year career.
There is no denying, though, that their new album, Your Favorite Toy, holds up incredibly well next to their early stuff (“Monky Wrench”, “Everlong”). I would even say it matches well against their 2000s/2010s-era music like In Your Honor (2005) and Waiting Light (2011).
Just listen to that new single, “Spit Shine”. It’s so magnificently fuzzy and gruny, but the melody is fully intact. And Grohl’s vocals are perfect, switching from throaty punk rock yells to that smooth, clean singing.
The Foos continue to impress, all these years later.
Radiohead
Radiohead started weird, stayed weird, and remains weird to this day. This is a compliment and, honestly, kind of an understatement.
I can remember hearing “Creep” for the first time when I was about 10. Even though I was a couple of years late to the party, it completely changed the way I understood music. Not just rock music, but all music.
These were sounds I never knew were possible. Sure, in the coming years, I would discover older bands like the Pixies and Depeche Mode, who were clear precursors to the 90s alt-rock scene. But there was still something about the way Radiohead would craft their songs that was just so captivatingly experimental.
I probably don’t have to tell you that this never stopped. Radiohead’s most recent album, A Moon Shaped Pool (2016), is now a decade old, and it’s just as otherworldly as their debut, Pablo Honey (1993). And if you’ve missed any of their concerts over the past several years, trust me, they’ve not lost an ounce of enchantment.
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