The 10 Best Alternative Rock Songs of All Time, Ranked

Image via Virgin Records/Lisa Johnson Published Nov 10, 2026, 11:48 PM EST Jeremy has more than 2900 published articles on Collider to his name, and has been writing for the site since February 2022. He's an omnivore when it comes to his movie-watching diet, so will gladly watch and write about almost anything, from old Godzilla films to gangster flicks to samurai movies to classic musicals to the French New Wave to the MCU... well, maybe not the Disney+ shows. His favorite directors include Martin Scorsese, Sergio Leone, Akira Kurosawa, Quentin Tarantino, Werner Herzog, John Woo, Bob Fosse, Fritz Lang, Guillermo del Toro, and Yoji Yamada. He's also very proud of the fact that he's seen every single Nicolas Cage movie released before 2022, even though doing so often felt like a tremendous waste of time. He's plagued by the question of whether or not The Room is genuinely terrible or some kind of accidental masterpiece, and has been for more than 12 years (and a similar number of viewings). When he's not writing lists - and the occasional feature article - for Collider, he also likes to upload film reviews to his Letterboxd profile (username: Jeremy Urquhart) and Instagram account. He has achieved his 2025 goal of reading all 13,467 novels written by Stephen King, and plans to spend the next year or two getting through the author's 82,756 short stories and 105,433 novellas. Sign in to your Collider account While rock music doesn’t seem to dominate pop culture the way it did, in various forms, throughout much of the 1960s, ‘70s, ‘80s, ‘90s, and even the 2000s (to some extent), people do still get passionate about rock music. It can be classic rock, or alternative rock, or maybe even some other kind of rock, but if you write about rock, people will feel strongly about it. It has been happening lately. So, here’s some more writing about rock. It’s not done to make anyone angry, but if you do get angry, hey, it’s not really all that surprising to the person who put all this together. These are a selection of tracks that are worthy of being considered the best alternative rock songs of all time. And sure, alternative rock was most dominant in the 1980s and 1990s, so maybe this is really a “best alternative rock songs of the 1980s and 1990s” kind of thing, but still, “all time” sounds a little better/fancier, doesn’t it? 10 "Black" (1991) Pearl Jam It is easy to make fun of Pearl Jam, and honestly sometimes quite fun to make fun of Pearl Jam. In hindsight, they sound a bit like hyper-grunge, or even like some sort of accidental parody of grunge, but early on, they were doing grunge very well. Grunge is a type of alternative rock, and you get some good grunge and/or alternative rock on Ten. Ten was Pearl Jam’s debut album, and though it frustratingly contained 11 tracks, one of those tracks was “Black,” and that makes the numbers not lining up a little easier to forgive. There’s a real desperation and passion to this song that can make it a hard listen, depending on your frame of mind at the time, but that is also a testament to the undeniable emotional kick (or punch? Whichever one’s more likely to hurt more) it delivers. 9 "Unsatisfied" (1984) The Replacements “Unsatisfied” is another angsty and hard-hitting song, which are qualities you're probably going to have to get used to experiencing/noticing if you listen to enough alternative rock. This song’s by The Replacements, and it is a track about feeling that titular emotion. That’s it. That’s all it needs to be, of course, when the execution is this good, but it is very straightforward. The Replacements had a knack for exploring emotions well, though, be they the kinds you often feel while listening to music, or maybe not so often. And another track from the same album (Let It Be) is quite ahead of its time: “Androgynous,” which doesn’t feel like it was recorded over 40 years ago, especially with what it deals with lyrically, and how it deals with it. That’s a very honorable mention, but “Unsatisfied” is placing just ahead of it here because it’s more of a rock song, while “Androgynous” is far gentler and more of a ballad. 8 "Let Down" (1997) Radiohead Radiohead might still be an alternative rock band, though from Kid A onward, there has been more of an electronic sound/focus. Not exclusively, but still undeniably. OK Computer might be the last properly “alternative rock” album of the band’s, even if it flirts a little with where they'd go sonically on Kid A, and so it feels right to include something from OK Computer here. It is not the album with “Creep.” Sorry. That’s always been the most famous Radiohead song. But it is the album with “Let Down,” and hopefully you're not feeling too let down that “Creep” isn't here, you creep; you weirdo. No, but truthfully, “Let Down” is such a beautiful and perfect song, not really rocking or feeling as loud as most of the other songs here, but that final minute or so (the big release) makes it more than worthy of inclusion. 7 "Smells Like Teen Spirit" (1991) Nirvana “Smells Like Teen Spirit” might be Nirvana’s “Creep,” but it’s also a much better song than “Creep,” so its overwhelming popularity feels a good deal easier to comprehend. And as a band, Nirvana feels less easy to mock than Pearl Jam, even with them being very distinctive and also tied up with the same genre/movement. Nirvana is grunge, and Nirvana did not last long enough to sell out or run the risk of becoming a parody of itself. The tragic nature of the band is always hard to overlook, which is what can also be said about going back and listening to Joy Division, knowing the truth about things. The anger found in much of Nirvana’s discography becomes more intense, in hindsight, but with “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” there is still that sense of toeing the line of selling out; doing something catchy but it nonetheless still “Sounds Like Nirvana.” 6 "Downtown Train" (1985) Tom Waits There is a cover of “Downtown Train” by Rod Stewart that isn't alternative rock, and if you can count it as rock, then it’s about as soft, mushy, and bland as rock gets. It’s kind of terrible. Stewart does not seem to get what makes the song special, or maybe he just doesn't. Tom Waits does get it, though. And he should, because he wrote it, but this is Waits at his absolute best, keeping his distinctive style while throwing himself into a song that’s more immediate and moving than the vast majority of his songs. And those other songs are great in other (not to mention usually more unusual) ways, so “Downtown Train” is possibly to Waits what “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was to Nirvana: both artists at their respective “poppiest.” There is still just the right amount of edge to this original version of “Downtown Train,” thankfully, and Waits doesn’t compromise on his vocal style, with the song being interesting because it’s moving, sweeping, and kind of grimy, all at once, and somehow not in a contradictory manner. 5 "She Bangs the Drums" (1989) The Stone Roses This song really moves. “She Bangs the Drums” is perfect, and it’s perfect on the album it belongs to (more or less the ideal second track for an energetic rock album), and then it’s also perfectly enjoyable on its own, if you feel like you don’t have the time to listen to all of the debut album by The Stone Roses. You should give that album a listen, though. The band’s discography is easy to churn through, truth be told, just because there are only two studio albums by The Stone Roses. The first is the one that is essential, and the other… well, it exists. It’s there. But there’s nothing that’s anywhere close to as good as “She Bangs the Drums” to be found on that one. 4 "Today" (1993) The Smashing Pumpkins Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness is a difficult album to look past if you want to judge something by its sheer ambition, because The Smashing Pumpkins did go for broke there and made something absolutely massive. It was twice as long (and you might argue less consistent) than the band’s previous album, Siamese Dream. Okay, sure, Siamese Dream could well be stronger just because the songs there do all fit together a little more coherently. It’s a very sad song that also manages to sound big and potentially even cathartic in some ways, or perhaps more cathartic if you don’t dig too deep into the lyrics. There are highlights on both albums, undoubtedly, with “Today” being the strongest track on Siamese Dream, and then it also could well be the band’s best song overall, too. It’s a very sad song that also manages to sound big and potentially even cathartic in some ways, or perhaps more cathartic if you don’t dig too deep into the lyrics… that aspect of “Today” is the properly soul-crushing part. 3 "Just Like Heaven" (1987) The Cure This song’s quite a bit nicer than “Today,” and from The Cure, who are a typically moodier band, perhaps even more so than The Smashing Pumpkins. “Just Like Heaven” is The Cure at their most romantic and sweeping, so there might well be an argument to be made that it’s more of a pop song than a rock one, but too bad, because this was an opportunity to shout out “Just Like Heaven,” and that opportunity has now been seized. It’s potentially cheesy to describe a song as feeling like something that captures the sensation of the early stage of being in love, but that is what “Just Like Heaven” does indeed do, just as effectively as some of the best love songs of all time (plenty have been more poppy than any other genre, and so many come from the 1960s, too). It is great, however you want to define or describe it. And that’s all that really matters, for now. 2 "How Soon Is Now?" (1984) The Smiths This is some more angst now, and it’s angst on an unusually epic scale, not to mention it’s all that by a band not really known for putting out too many long songs. That band’s The Smiths, and a lot of songs by The Smiths manage to do a lot with just two, or maybe three-ish minutes. “This Charming Man,” for instance, is a rather perfect two minutes and 41 seconds, and “Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want” is hugely emotional while clocking in at 10 seconds shy of two minutes. But it’s “How Soon Is Now?” that’s going to get included here, partly because it feels about as close to “hard” rock as The Smiths ever got, and also because it definitely feels strange in some ways, and thereby fulfills the “alternative” part of “alternative rock” alongside also doing the “rock” thing very well. This song is heavy on the ears, and then the lyrics cut very deep, even by the standards of The Smiths (an endlessly miserable – but largely in a good way – band). 1 "Here Comes Your Man" (1989) Pixies Like with The Stone Roses (the self-titled album, not the band), Doolittle is an alternative rock album from 1989 that you really should listen to from start to finish. But if you're as pressed for time here as you were for The Stone Roses, for whatever reason, then just sample “Here Comes Your Man,” either before or after “She Bangs the Drums.” Not at the same time; not one playing into one ear and the other into the other. You're not THAT pressed for time, surely? And then the trend of shouting out an artist’s most immediate song continues here, since “Here Comes Your Man” is a little less intense than a fair few other songs by Pixies… though to be fair, many of those intense songs are still very catchy. Also, sure, some songs were picked here for reasons other than them being very immediate, so there’s been little consistency. Apologies, but alternative music should do things a little differently than mainstream/pop music, so the inconsistency was, uh, spiritually in line with the sub-genre of rock being discussed. Yeah, let’s go with that. That’ll do. Pixies: Gouge Release Date April 27, 2004 Runtime 50 minutes Director Matt Quin Cast Joey Santiago Joey Santiago David Lovering David Lovering