25 Best Rock Albums of 1991

Some years give us pretty solid rock records, but there’s the occasional year that changes the face of rock music. The year 1991 was one of those game-changing years and you can see that evolution within our 25 Best Rock Albums of 1991.

Coming out of the ’80s, there was a status quo of labels pushing out accessible heavy music that would get radio play, with some of these acts falling under the hair metal label. But by the fall of ’91, hard rock was about to get the jolt it needed to shake things up in the form of Nirvana … and then Pearl Jam, Soundgarden and what amounted to the birth of the grunge era.

In fact, the door was opened to a lot of alternative rock that had once been relegated to college radio stations. In 1991, there was a funk metal breakout led by Red Hot Chili Peppers, which also included Fishbone and Infectious Grooves bringing some heavy groove on a smaller scale.

R.E.M., once college radio darlings, were now topping radio and sales charts and winning Grammys and standing side-by-side with Guns N’ Roses and Van Halen.

Simply put, 1991 started a music revolution bringing a more diverse plate of rock offerings to the table. So check out the gallery below and revisit the 25 Best Rock Albums of 1991.