Noise rock, from the outside in. Each step is a genre and the single record this encyclopedia would put on first. Play them in this order and the last one should sound like a next step rather than a wall.
- 1 The way in
Rock 1954
The whole family: guitar, bass, drums and a beat borrowed from blues and rhythm and blues. Every branch below grows out of this trunk, metal included.
Sung. Melodic singing throughout.
Put on
The Beatles - Revolver, if you want to understand why everything branched so fast.
The Beatles, Revolver (1966) - 2 Then
Alternative rock 1985
An umbrella for everything that grew outside commercial radio and then conquered it. Defined originally by the college-radio network, not by any one sound.
Sung. Melodic singing throughout.
Put on
Pixies - Doolittle. Cobain admitted he was simply trying to write a Pixies song.
Pixies, Doolittle (1989) - 3 What you asked about
Noise rock 1983
Alternate tunings, feedback as an instrument and rhythm sections that hit like machinery. The grandfather of sludge.
Shouted. Barked or chanted, and you can still make out the words.
Put on
The Jesus Lizard - Goat. The rhythm section sounds like heavy plant in operation.
The Jesus Lizard, Goat (1991) - 4 Where to go next
Crust punk 1984
D-beat soaked in metal and mud: thick tone, apocalyptic themes, trousers unwashed since 1989.
Growled or shrieked. Unintelligible without a lyric sheet. The thing most newcomers bounce off.
Put on
Amebix - Arise! It sounds like the end of the world, which was the point.
Amebix, Arise! (1985)
Assembled from the tree: every genre Noise rock descends from, in order. Noise rock has no subgenres, so the last step is the genre that rates closest to it by sound.