The top 10 Hard Rock Albums in the last Decade

It's no hidden secret that I am an ex-metal junkie. I was notorious for listening to bands who, ironically, were not really quite metal but were certainly in the hard rock category. In the last ten years there have been some smashing records, and as far as I'm concerned are the only mainstream musicians to hit the radio with any originality. Bands in this group include Disturbed and Staind, but also have a few other 'weaker' bands as well. I've compiled a short list of ten albums released since 1998 that encompass the greater achievements in hard rock.

The infamous nu-metal/post grunge outfit that was claimed to have derived its being from the hard-hitter gig named Creed. This album included their only real radio hits, topping the charts with "Blurry" (still played today)and the other hit "Control." The band itself hasn't changed much since these hits, so this is their 15 minutes of fame. Better have enjoyed it while it lasted.

When Disturbed first hit the mainstream radio waves with "Down With the Sickness", the radio almost blew up. We expected similar sounds in their follow up album "Believe" andtrue to their name, we got it. The band then evolved into a more melodic, almost post-retro sound with "Fists." I'm not going to lie, we fans were disappointed! Not only did the band wander from its industrial rock foundation, but it adopted a more melodic and radio friendly tone. The only thing that remained was the profanity, and that much we know Draiman hasn't sacrificed.This was the first album Draiman was also a practicing jew during the recording process, so the once anger-driven, anti-religion lyric that clouded the first two albums had vanished (or at least been watered down and traded for political jargon). This album has numerous hits on it, most notoriously "Stricken" which was followedby its carbon copied "Just Stop." On the album was a hidden gem entitled "Overburdened", but like most of the better songs MTV glances over, you probably haven't even heard it before.

I used to be an enormous Creed fan. This probably arose from my classical music training in my earlier years, or it's because my entire school idolized them. We're talking they would kill for tickets.

Creed never really hit home after the craze, occasinally the music drags me back to those carefree years of doing nothing and studying even less. In the end, however, I feel that the band was definitely more than a passing phase. There are still die hard fans of Stapp and Alterbridge, myself included on the latter mentioned, and in this respect their most "diverse album to-date" (Tremonti) demands a good ranking.

The ranking is due to two songs: "One Last Breath" and "My Sacrifice", the band's two number one hits that everyone still knows how to pick on the guitar. I can't remember a single soul I was connected to in those years who hadn't heard those songs in some way, shape or form. In fact, I can't remember anyone who didn't like those songs! "Weathered" may be their strongest production ever, and personally for me I connected with so many of the songs on the album.

While I will admit Staind brought an aire of sensitivity to the bleak genre, they were by no means "soft." While they seemed to vocalise their favouritism of heavy metal and screamo, their choices of singles that made radio play denied those claims. They instead ended up reaching deeper into a more nirvana-grunge acoustic sound and resulted in enormous sales and even topping the music charts on a few occasions. "14 Shades of Grey" is an example of such introspective rock, with Aaron Lewis sounding almost optimistic through the entire ordeal. The standout track, "So Far Away", topped charts for 14 straight weeks and actually made me tear up the first time I heard it (an effect that shortly disappeared). "How About You", "Price to Play," and "Zoe Jane" are excusable misses for the band, albeit the first mentioned was arguably my favourite on the recording.

The band's explosive debut is considered by many to be the most innovative album to hit the genre since Nirvana. While it is what I consider far from radio friendly, there was an edge of raw angst that is missing from majority of the albums released in similar fashion. The title track alone obligates the listener to buy the entire album, and what you will find inside is the lack of filler tracks (those are saved for later albums like "Indestructable"). Disturbed has never been an incredibly popular ban, but its followers were sold to their sound through this album. They have since followed up with successful encore, but it seems as if they've lost much of the magic that existed when they first began.

I am not a fan of Tool whatsoever. I am an artist in heart and soul, but their music has never clicked with this man. "Lateralus" might have been the closest thing to registering, however. While I have not listened to the entire thing I am willing to admit a few facts: one, that thisalbum is innovative and progressive; two, that it is colourful and original; and three, it is arguably the finest work of abstract art in mainstream music ever. This gives Pink Floyd a run for its money, and while I feel that I'd rather have placed another favourite at number 5, I do feel that this list is not just a personal rant for 10 of my favourite albums.

The only time Creed outdid itself entirely was with this album. The single "Higher" spurred the album's sales to record heights alone. This album is listener friendly, chart topping, hard rocking and most of all, easy to enjoy. While many claim Pearl Jam lost its sound to Creed, I have never been able to find any similarities between them. Vocals, perhaps, but come on...Stapp versus Eddie? There's no competition. While Eddie trumps the vocals over Stapp, I will say that Creed found their sound much faster and more efficiently than Pearl Jam ever did, and to the dismay fo the latter their success with it. Where the Jam will stick to a more grungier sound, Creed wasn't afraid to open up and twist a retro guitar riff with some hard rock. "Human Clay" is an example of this band's prime time moment.

This album is what I call the most underrated release of 2007. While the band tried vigorously to detach its former-Creed image, they actually fell straight into classic rock. Their sound adopts a blues-undertone and this is explicitly noticeable in the title track. While the band's sophmore release is at times doggedly slow and very repugnant, the heights of their signature tracks outweighs the immediate losses of the very few stink bombs on the record. The album itself is long and tiresome towards the last third, but if you simply ignore most of the end you won't be disappointed at all. Mark Tremonti is as strong as ever and has adopted an even more impressive attack on the strings of his rig. He also blends nicely with Myles Kennedy (who also plays guitar this time around). The entire band sounds as tight as they ever have and this promises a grand release in the following years for those of us who enjoy something a bit different on the radio.

I was very reluctant to rank this album at #2 and I still am. I did however think thru the decision long and hard, mostly because of one key factor in this album's history--it virtually launched the post-grunge phase into existence. Not only that, but all four singles released on the radio hit number one status, and the title track alone drove the band's debut to sell as well as it did. I remember hearing the band for the first time and realising that, perhaps, the radio had some hope after all. Not only was the band more positive than their grunge counterparts, but the music itself seemed to carry some life in it. Otherwise, if this album happened 10 years too late, it would have been disregarded as another run-of-the-mill post grunge defect. The question remains, however: would the genre have even existed without this release?

I would argue that it would not.

The number one post-grunge album of all time piqued my interest, not because it was a release by the infamous Staind, but more because the nature of the album. At the time this album was considered inventive, original and poignant. Their successive releases have capitalised on this exact sound (and lsot the ingenuity), but the band itself is contained wholly within this album alone. Every facet of the soul is described in the lyrics and the music alone can drive one to anger or to tears. The record setting "It's Been Awhile" has for nearly a decade defined the acoustic rock sound and is arguably the defining moment when post-grunge stopped being about despair and when it actually took a turn upwards, even if just for a fleeting moment.

Staind outdid themselves and everyone else on this album, and to this day it is regarded as one of the top alternative rock releases in history.