ONTD

Over time, rock and roll lost touch with its "Love Me Tender" and "Peggy Sue" beginnings and became kind of a closet Quiet Storm listener sometime around the time Ozzy Osbourne entered the collective consciousness. Except even hair metal was dominated by lighter-wavers. Basically, no one can resist ballads, no matter how hard they try, and here are ten acts few would've predicted made their best work when succumbing to the call of the slow jam.

Red Hot Chili Peppers

Maybe this one's obvious. Few people admit to loving Anthony Kiedis' raps, but even the most stalwart Chili Peppers hater can't resist "Under the Bridge," which ties with Pearl Jam's "Yellow Ledbetter" as the prettiest Hendrixian guitar of the '90s. The band themselves noted this, and went on to replace "Suck My Kiss" with Grammy-friendly melodies like "Scar Tissue" and "Otherside." What's surprising is how these songs ended up being the best music they ever made. Sure these got bland well before they dropped the anvil of Stadium Arcadium on a long-bored America. But if you dismissed them too early, you missed the plainly lovely "Dosed."

Pearl Jam

With love to the melismatic marvels of Chris Cornell, Eddie Vedder was the only grunge singer born to croon. From the debut album's languid "Black" to the down-home country of "Daughter" to the Otis-worthy "Nothingman" to the Harvest-worthy "Off He Goes," you could compile an entire greatest hits collection from PJ's prettiest. 1998's Yield was especially generous, with "Wishlist" and the underrated "In Hiding." But there's a reason their biggest hit (yup) was a formidable cover of "Last Kiss."

LCD Soundsystem

This is another no-brainer, as James Murphy's meta-tantrums about having to act his age would be mere novelties without the context of their heart-on-sleeve B-sides. "North American Scum" was a hoot of a catharsis for Bush America, while the piano-whittling "All My Friends" and EKG-blipping "Someone Great" told the flipside of people who go missing during hard times. "Drunk Girls" was secretly his smartest ever collection of thoughts ("Drunk girls know that love is an astronaut/ It comes back but it's never the same," oh GOD yes) but it staved off accusations of mean-spiritedness by being coupled with the broken prom theme "I Can Change" and the comedown-at-dawn "Home."

The Velvet Underground

For all the legend of white noise, proto-50 Shades BDSM and harrowing drug tributes, very few people in 2013 argue that Most Influential Band Ever's finest work was their third and most subdued album, The Velvet Underground. "Pale Blue Eyes" has become their most-covered standard and it kicks the shit out of "Yesterday," while "After Hours" proved a throwaway could become a classic. The soul ballad "I Found a Reason" is one of rock's all-time prettiest songs--do not die before seeking out the Dylanesque demo version, complete with harmonica. And leaving 1969's glockenspiel and string-adorned "Stephanie Says" in the vault until the 1980s was arguably the most antisocial punk move of their whole existence.

Sebadoh

Lou Barlow was never cut out for indie noise. But it sure made a nice bed for his grade-A sap to cut through unsuspectingly. No indie-rock band has ever had a streak like "Truly Great Thing," "Brand New Love," "Soul and Fire," "Not a Friend" and "On Fire" across five different albums. And topping it all off was 1996's incredible "Too Pure," which deserved to be as big as "Everlong." How did he get away with all that sincerity in a clattering slacker band? Because those songs beat the clattering slacker ones.


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