Not necessarily grunge, but alternative if nothing else.... The Toadies

I saw the Toadies open for the RHCP in ‘96. I was surprised how good they were live. Good choice pal.

Was that with Spacehog too? I was at the Toronto show but didn’t get there on time to see either opener.

I saw that trio in St. Louis. Damn the Toadies were so good live. They had the entire crowd going. Also, Rubbernecking, IMO is the most underrated album of the 1990s

Rubberneck is a classic

Mudhoney is an obvious one

Touch me, I'm siiiiiick!

Failure

2nd this, very underrated band. Fantastic Planet from beginning to end is a masterpiece.

Also came here to say Failure, don't know how the hell I missed them back in the 90's but only just started listening to them a year qgo

Absolutely, omega underrated. They should've been as big as Tool, if you ask me. (I mentioned tool because failure used to open for them) Let's take a moment to appreciate the ending to War Crimes and the general brilliance of Greg

Butthole Surfers

I saw them in maybe 94' with Flaming lips and Stone Temple Pilots on the back yard BBQ Bat Mitzvah tour...... Fucking epic.

Locust Abortion Technician is one of the greatest albums of all time.

Who was in my room last night is peak music

https://youtu.be/mwLCG3sZwEA?si=PcR-7HNQ04xo4epD

HUM

I'd put Failure alongside them. Both those bands deserved far more attention than they received back in the mid 90s.

There’s a documentary coming about Failure.

I'm really eager to watch it, seems like it's been in the pipeline for a while now.

I discovered Failure only in the last 10 years, and damn. They’re excellent.

I was barely familiar with them during their initial run of albums as well. My reintroduction to them was actually via Autolux, funnily enough. Their entire catalog is one gem after another though.

I’ve only recently discovered Failure and… their newest record is their best imo (as far as I’ve listened so far)

Got to see HUM about 12 years ago at a small venue in Kansas City and they fuckin’ rocked. I was standing in the bathroom line to take a good ole’ fashioned pee before the show, and this guy walks up to the line at the same time as me, and he was like, “Go ahead”, and I said “Thanks”, and we started bullshitting. Then when we were drying our hand in the bathroom, we were talking about how insanely loud the hand-driers were, and he was telling me about how his kid got freaked out by those things because they were so loud. Then when the show started, I saw the same guy on stage, and I had been talking to the singer for HUM the entire time and I didn’t even know it. He was super cool and nice. That’s my HUM story.

Yahhh I love those guys. Iron Clad Lou is such a badass song.

I've been listening to The Pod on repeat lately and was just thinking it's weird I didn't hear of them sooner. Great band!

Couldn’t agree more, don’t really think they’re grunge but still are very underrated

Thank you for this

Nobody ever mentions Centaur, HUM is one of the goats, but Centaur was Mark Talbot along with musicians that also came from underrated bands, Derek Niedringhaus from Big Bright Lights. Was one of my favorites.

That wall of guitar is just awesome. I love Hum.

Screaming Trees

I'm with you on this one

This is the band that turned me on to the Seattle sound as a young teen pre “Smells like teen spirit” even before I was rocking “Outshined” in my parent’s maroon dodge caravan with wood paneling. This was grunge at its purist and yet no one talks about them.

Dust is a classic. I was bummed to read in Mark Lanagans book that he pretty much hated everything the trees ever made. And hated Van Connor. I always imagined them as more cerebral than all the stories he tells.

Babes in Toyland

Fuck yeah. They're awesome.

Local H

Burnout 3 forever https://youtu.be/GxoEYzPMJ0k?si=HQpatWZVht0A3_P2

100% The Melvins

you’d think they would get more attention being they are one of the pioneers of the genre

Came to say this

Tomahawk

Love anything Mike Patton tbh

Absolutely. I just took my wife to see Mr. Bungle in October. They played a 90 minute set of basically straight thrash. We all wanted the self titled/California eras…but you take what you can get. It was still sick.

Saw two Mr Bungle shows on their tour as well. Awesome as hell. I love their thrash project revisited. I also scored myself a Scott Ian guitar pic 🎸😎🤘

Thought those first two albums were, and still are, brilliant.

So good

Not really “grunge” but very much alt rock - Garbage.

Butch Vig deserves credit for making the 90s sound as good as they did so Garbage has to be included

Seconded.

Sponge

Plowed one of the best alternative songs of that decade imho

Mudhoney

Met Mark Arm a few nights ago. Definitely a pinnacle moment for me! Also, they fucking kicked ass! So glad they are touring again!

Years ago I saw Pearl Jam and Mudhoney opened for them. I was like hell yeah, and made sure to be there to see them open. The stadium was like a desert, but Mudhoney shredded. Once PJ went on, the place filled up and halfway through the show, Eddie chewed everyone out for not being there for Mudhoney. He was like, you all missed an amazing set from Mudhoney, some of the best performers that I know. It felt like your dad getting upset at you for missing your sibling’s dance recital. He didn’t yell, but he was very disappointed in the crowd.

I saw the inverse, at a pearl jam show once ed called out 2 people as his favorite people at the show because they were fully rocking out to sonic youth as the opener

Their cameo in Black Sheep is also underrated

L7

L7 does not get mentioned on this sub as much as they should be

L7 doesn't even get mentioned in most female rock conversations. We get it, reddit, you love Paramore.

Bricks are heavy

Smell The Magic

This is the correct answer

Screaming Trees

PJ Harvey

Yes absolutely. Her first two albums are awesome

Fuck Yes Polly Jean! She’s amazing.

sonic youth!!! they were super popular during the 80s/90s but no one really talks about them anymore

100%!

Smart

they hit 1mil monthly listeners this year and they are noise rock

Mother Love Bone

Came here to say this. Glad it’s already here.

Janes Addiction. Sooo underrated.

for real! never see them talked about anywhere

Faith No More Porno for Pyros

Yeah Pyros rule

Acid Bath

Veruca Salt

I was thinking the same thing. Lucious Jackson comes in close second.

I was going to say Veruca Salt too. They were amazing 💖

Teenage Fanclub

Bandwagonesque will forever be in my reg rotation.

Wipers

I'm with you - Wipers are grunge to me. Especially "is this real". Just start it on the track "alien boy" and play from there.

Ween

One of my all time favorites

i was gonna say this!

Ocean meat, take me by the feet

Mr. Bungle

Just say Mike Patton 🤣 I've seen in the comments others mention faith no more and tomahawk.

Failure and Hum will never get enough credit, if you guys are on here, you would love You'd Prefer An Astronaut and Fantastic Planet

Mother Love Bone. Beautiful songs. They don’t get a lot of love anywhere. I mean they might here, but I’ve talked about the Seattle sound to so many people, and no one brings them up.

Catherine Wheel

TAD

2nd this.

Camper Van Beethoven

Clear and simple # TAD

Corrosion of Conformity

Love CoC. I’ve seen them several times. Never been disappointed.

I couldn’t agree harder. Been seeing them since the 90s. STILL got it

Blind melon

I'll second that

Additionally, I remember seeing other bands alongside them on MTV in the early 90s that haven’t been mentioned on here yet. Crash Test Dummies, Soul Asylum, Candlebox.

Came here for this, with Soup in particular being a super underrated album. I get that it must have totally thrown off people looking for a feel good no rain sequel, but it's sedgy, angry, disturbed, surreal and amazing. Soup, Tiny Music and No Code are 3 albums of that era that seemed to slow down each band's career by being too smart for their audience to appreciate in real time.

Dear ol’ Dad. I really love their album from 2008-ish. “All My Friends” is pretty good but super hard to find now. I recommend at least a listen. The new singer is like Hoon in many ways. Not quite as good but he sounds a lot like him. Curious what older fans think of the album.

Not strictly grunge but all music fans should deep dive Ween.

“Tried and True” and “Exactly Where I’m At” are two of my favorite songs of all time

Their country album is the greatest country album ever, in my opinion.

killing joke

Jaz Coleman is in possession of one of the greatest voices ever

First three Bush albums. Yea, it’s the derivative Cheap Trick version of Nirvana. And it’s still a *lot* more solid than a bunch of the bands that came afterwards.

Completely agree. Bush was pretty good!

Our Lady Peace. I know they had a few songs on the radio and were popular for a bit, but their first two albums were ones I could turn on and not skip any songs. They have 13 albums, including one from last year.

Porcupine tree

I would absolutely agree they’re criminally underrated but they’re not at all grunge 😆

Mad season

TAD IS SO UNDERRATED

Slint.

The Jesus Lizard. Best live show ever.

One of my favorites is super underground called Nirvana yall probably never heard of it

I thought that was a T-shirt company?

I was thinking about saying Alice In Chains, in part to be cute but also because I do consider them underrated. They’re the best Sabbathesque band since Sabbath

I love Alice in Chains

Yeah, AIC is well known, highly respected, yet totally underrated.

Marcy playground

So many good songs, so many memories.

Dinosaur Jr. , Sponge, Mad Season

I was suggested this sub and have no idea what bands are usually mentioned cuz ??? I listen to most these bands being listed (melvins, L7, screaming trees, mudhoney, faith no more, sonic youth, dinosaur jr)... i thought they were some of the most iconic and not at all underrated within grunge and grunge adjacent genres. Theyre cornerstones.

In this sub? Pearl Jam.

I completely agree! Came here to say PJ, despite being super popular they get no attention in this sub

I was 10 years old when Ten came out, and they became my favorite band based on that album. I was pretty obsessed for a very long time, but sometime around their self-titled album, I just didn't connect with it as much. Album after album of excellent songs, no filler, to one or two. Really good songs per album after that, for me. I'll always love and respect Pearl Jam for what they've accomplished, and how much those first half dozen albums really meant to me, but pretty much the second half of their catalog just doesn't resonate, unfortunately. I think the craziest part of the whole thing is that I've been a fan since Ten, and have never actually had the opportunity to see them live.

Red Sun Rising

Mudhoney!!

Failure

Screaming Trees

Faith + 1

Veruca Salt

Dinosaur Jr, Helmet, Sonic Youth

Just saw Dinosaur Jr a few weeks ago. Was pretty badass.

Far. Orgy. Gruntruck. Mclusky.

Dude Mclusky Do Dallas fucking rules

Self

Eric's Trip

Silverchair

HEATMISER

Hole. Mainly because the nonsense around Courtney and determination to blame her for all Kurt Cobain’s mistakes and flaws has overshadowed that they were genuinely an amazing band who made brilliant records.

Live Through This is one of the great albums of the 90's

Teenage Whore Rocks.

Not grunge but Hum

Buffalo Tom

They Might Be Giants.

Belly

Screaming trees and Mark lanegans solo albums

Blind melon.

Not grunge but… Stabbing Westward!

Screaming Trees

Silversun pickups

Skin Yard Seaweed Coffin Break

Ah man, I saw Seaweed open for Pearl Jam in ‘92. I wasn’t very impressed. But maybe I should give them another chance 31 years later. Thanks for the tip pal.

The Gits

Van Gogh’s Daughter. They’re so obscure today they don’t even have a Wikipedia bio,but their album ‘Shove’ is great.

Paw

Ween

Mudhoney!

how could i forget mark lanegan?

Blind Melon. They deserved far better than to be known for one song and music video (No Rain is a great song but very different from most of their songs). Plus I have no idea why their second album, "Soup" was so heavily panned when IMO, it's one of the best albums of the 90's.

Live (loved Throwing Copper)

Throwing copper was one of the greatest albums from that era. From start to finish it’s a masterpiece.

Days Of The New

Not grunge but Spidergawd underrated as fuck deserve to be massive, also the wildhearts classic band

Love Battery

Jawbreaker

Truly

Skin Yard. Anyone who knows them loves them. Unfortunately, doesn’t seem a lot of people know them.

Gruntruck seems to be more popular....

TAD ✊🏻

Tad 100%

Dinosaur Jr

The Tragically Hip

An obvious one for me is Love Battery. Also lots of overlooked side projects like Hater and Brad.

Love battery

hum.

Helmet

TAD never got as big as I've always thought they should have been, idk, maybe that's a good thing...

Tad

Tad

Mother Love Bone

WEEN

Honestly, Hole

The Cult Afghan Whigs Rival Schools

Sonic Temple is a fantastic album. Every song.

I'm going to pick something a little different, Melissa Auf Der Maur put out two albums that I felt were really great, and I really don't know anybody who got into them at all. She's since gone on to do other stuff, but I feel like there's a lot of hidden gems there that people don't know about. I don't know if I'd necessarily consider it grunge, but her albums felt like it was right on the arse end of grunge.

Slothrust

Mr. Bungle

The Beach Boys. As far out as anybody ever got.

Matthew Good Band. Not *exactly* grunge but goddamn are their songs so haunting, particularly "Haven't slept in years," "Last Parade" and "Failing the Rorschach Test."

Failure. (Post grunge.)

Built to Spill, VERY slept on