The Melvins

The very title of the Melvins album — 1994's Stoner Witch, the perfect swamp-trudging companion to the previous year's Houdini — embodies everything that makes them so menacing and memorable. At least in the eyes of most listeners, who typically draw comparisons between the sludge-metal vets and Black Sabbath, the original architects of teeth-rattling riffs and slow-and-low rhythms. But there's much more at play here, including pummeling thrash-punk tempos ("Honey Bucket"), axe-grinding glimpses of classic rock ("The Kicking Machine"), and rumbling passages of drone tones ("Boris," which inspired the name of Japan's leading underground metal band). Our Next Steps also draws blood from the best Melvins albums, along with a couple of key EPs.

Anyone convinced the Melvins hit their peak with the ooze-dipped discs of the late '80s and early '90s — the template-setting trio of Gluey Porch Treatments, Ozma, and Bullhead — needs to listen to the band's string of renaissance records in recent years. With drummer Coady Willis and bassist Jared Warren of Big Business now backing up the core duo of drummer Dale Crover and guitarist/vocalist Buzz Osborne, the band has sharpened its teeth-gnashing sound even further, as heard through the hollow percussion and guillotine guitars of "Billy Fish," the churning hooks of "The Hawk," and the metallic machine music of "A Vast Filthy Prison." Of course, the Melvins are also known for pushing people's buttons, a fact that's hammered home with the experimental flourishes of our Deep Cuts.

Navigating through all of the EPs, demos, singles, and side projects in the Melvins' deep, two-decades-plus catalog would take several days and an undying amount of patience. That's why we skimmed their finest left-field selections for you: the surprisingly smooth grooves of "Up the Dumper," the demonic Christmas sleigh chimes of "Toy," the skin-crawling horror score of "Wispy," en epic, plodding live version of "Spread Eaglebeagle," and such part-time gigs as the demonic drone-metal of Thrones and the animated mayhem of Mike Patton's Fantômas quartet, which features Buzz Osborne, Slayer's drummer (Dave Lombardo) and Patton's fellow Mr. Bungle survivor, bassist Trevor Dunn.

Now here's something you might not know about the Melvins: Kurt Cobain auditioned for their bassist spot early on, but was so nervous in their presence that he forgot the band's songs. Suffice it to say, he didn't get the job but that didn't keep the Nirvana frontman from helping his heroes with an Atlantic deal later on. While that major-label contract led to a couple of the band's most consistent (and some would say classic) albums — Houdini, Stoner Witch — the Melvins were eventually dropped due to a lack of sales. Not that the group cared. Aside from the trademark doom-and-gloom tracks of early albums, like Ozma and Gluey Porch Treatments, the Melvins have always been impossible to pin down. In fact, Atlantic was so confused by the band's P***k record that they refused to release it. Us? We think it's as genius as every other head-scratching moment in the group's dense discography.