On 1994's Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain, Pavement refined their lo-fi sound to write one of the defining albums of 1990s indie rock

The 1998 debut Stratosphere by Duster eschews traditional song structures for ambient noise experimentation and droning indie guitar rock

On their third and final album, Bedhead refine their spacious slowcore sound with thoughtful guitar arrangements and haunting melodies

Skeleton Key combined East Coast punk and indie rock with an unconventional rhythm section to give their 1997 debut a unique twist

Tom Waits' Grammy Winning eleventh album Bone Machine from 1992 is a wild ride of strange characters and stripped-down production

On their fourth album Too Many Days Without Thinking, Swell make the most of acoustic moodiness, jittery rhythms, and frazzled distortion

Eels sophomore release Electro-Shock Blues is an emotionally devastating record that manages to grow more poignant as its audience matures

What happens when bands reverse the dreaded sophomore slump? We discuss our favorite sophomore albums of the 90s.

On their 1999 album The Ideal Crash, dEUS explore the studio and expand their sound to unique but mixed results

On his 1997 sophomore solo album The Lateness Of The Hour, Eric Matthews' orchestral pop mastery is in full bloom

What was and is Britpop? We're not sure, so we're hosting a roundtable to try figure out the sounds, bands, legacy and more

Conjure memories of New Order and the Smashing Pumpkins, Placebo charts a confusing and confrontational path on Without You I'm Nothing

Written and recorded after the departure of co-founding lead singer and songwriter Mark Olsen, it rests on the shoulders of Gary Louris.

Some describe Grandaddy's sound as lo-fi space-rock, drawing comparisons to The Flaming Lips, Brian Wilson and Pavement.

Bob Pollard abandoned his trademark lo-fi sound to release a major label album, produced by the legendary Cars leader Ric Ocasek,