The Best Hard Rock Album of Each Year of the 2000s

What was the best hard rock album of each year of the 2000s?

What a decade it was as we saw significant shifts in what was becoming popular in music and in youth culture in general. The decade started with nu-metal hitting its peak and dominating radio.

Amidst all the clutter of labels rushing to sign the next big nu-metal act, one rose above pack and actually had the best hard rock album for two of the years within the 2000s. We’re talking about Linkin Park, who became one of the most commercially successful bands of the decade while being able to zig before the nu-metal expiration date arrived.

But it wasn’t all nu-metal!

The early part of the decade had a very stellar crop of emerging pop-punk bands with perhaps the biggest statement album of the decade coming from ’90s pop-punk vets Green Day who channeled their anxiety of the modern world into an ambitious rock opera that had fans and critics buzzing back in 2004.

The decade also saw a rather quick groundswell of support for emo in the mid-2000s and the eventual emergence of a wave of post-grunge acts in the latter half of the decade who were just getting their footing in the decade’s first half.

Simply put, there was a little something for everyone on the rock front and our look at the decade’s best hard rock albums will reflect that it was never easy to get too comfortable with just one style of music leading the way.