Bro Rock

Almost anyone can find some way to rock, but if you can hammer out a heavy-duty air-guitar lick while simultaneously fist-bumpin' your buddy, then you're rockin' like a bro. When bro-rock king Chad Kroeger of Nickelback roars out his memories of a gloriously misspent youth on "Photograph," his bittersweet-but-bad-to-the-bone tone tells you he wouldn't change a minute of it. The grunge-grinding guitars and from-the-gut wail of Creed is the ladder that leads "Higher" — straight on up to the spiritual side of the bro. But before you get all hung up on the high-minded stuff, an endless series of Wayne's World-style we're-not-worthys are in store when the hard-rockin' howl of original bro Diamond Dave leaps out of Van Halen's steamin'-demon scorcher "Runnin' with the Devil."

In Next Steps, follow a day in the life of the bro, courtesy of classic-rock gods and metal maniacs.

After he's done working his 9-to-5, the bro can frequently be found hoisting some brews while blasting these tunes loud and proud — with his fellow bros by his side, naturally. Judas Priest's jolting jam "Living After Midnight" holds up double-handed devil horns to the idea of a hard-livin' crew burning the candle at both ends. You can almost hear the whiskey-soaked sing-along voices rising ruggedly to the top of their range on Boston's sky-climbing stadium-rocker "More Than a Feeling." And if there's ever been a time to fly the T.C.B. sign high in the air, it's when Bachman-Turner Overdrive's boogie-rockin' monster "Takin' Care of Business" comes stomping out of the speakers over synchronized shouts of "B! T! O!!!"

In Deep Cuts, we'll journey to the soft underbelly of the bro . . .

You might think they're all about backwards baseball caps and game-day highlight reels, but you'd better believe bros have their sensitive side, too — especially when it comes to the ups and downs of love. The moody-but-manly vibes start to spread when Seether sweetens their sound with Evanescence's awesome Amy Lee to belt out the lonesome tones of "Broken." You'll want to round up some buddies to ride shotgun on your own sorrow when Black Stone Cherry's "Please Come In" shows that you can still rock out with a busted-up heart. And don't be surprised at the heavy back-slapping and sloppy-but-sincere shouts of "I love you, man" that occur when the Calling's lighter-waving anthem of devotion "Wherever You Will Go" goes beyond boy-girl stuff, underscoring the all-for-one ethic of the Bro Code.

See that tatted-up dude with the winged-snake hoodie, feelin' every Nickelback and 3 Doors Down verse and chorus as if he'd written them himself? Welcome to the world of bro rock, where the biggest, baddest bands in the land let their guard down and open up a vein — unleashing all the pain, passion, and straight-up power a mere three-minute song can possibly contain. From the takin'-it-to-the-streets strut of Thin Lizzy's guys-gone-wild classic "The Boys Are Back in Town," to the eyebrow-pierced angst of Staind's candle-lit cry "It's Been Awhile," we've stacked up a fist-bumpin' Bro Rock Essentials — track after mighty track that ROCKS 'til dawn but, more often than not, still leaves plenty of room for some deep-down emotion. In other words, we've got 75 ways for you to bond with the boys and let it out, all in the name of the king-sized riff.