From the ashes of 60s blues rock, Led Zeppelin took off and wrote the template for all hard rock that followed. But it was all just an extension of the blues tradition itself

Everybody's got to start somewhere, and some of our very best bands started slowly. Here's 10 great bands whose debut albums weren't actually great

Even the best can get it wrong sometimes: here's the worst albums by 10 of rock's greatest bands

Fistfights, ulcers and run-ins with the law were all part of the Eagles’ everyday life: A look behind the rise, fall and unexpected rise again of the ultimate Californian band

In 2003 Classic Rock spoke to Nikki Sixx about Motley Crue's upcoming movie The Dirt. It wouldn't see the light of day for another sixteen years

Magnum have never joined rock’s big league, but these Brummies have nevertheless produced some of pomp rock’s best albums

It’s not just the greatest AOR album ever made, Journey’s Escape also flies high outside the genre as one of the greatest albums in rock

From big hitters like Journey, Boston and Foreigner to the lesser known lights of AOR, these are the 50 albums that truly sparkle

One day. Three albums released. Music changed forever

Big hair and bad spandex almost killed any credibility metal had in the 1980s. But metal not only survived, it also came back bigger than ever. Here’s how…

In 2009, the sobered-up Guns N' Roses veteran spoke to Classic Rock from a position of domestic bliss and reduced drama, while promoting a new Loaded album

Legendary rock journalist Mick Wall was famously called out by Axl Rose on Guns N' Roses' furious Get In The Ring. Is his new book about the band the chance to settle old scores?

Former Skid Row singer, Broadway star and reality TV stalwart Sebastian Bach on the best and worst drugs, Axl Rose, and working until the day you die...

Drugs, rifts, hirings, firings, and the sound of a band falling apart. Slash, Duff McKagan, Steven Adler and more tell the story of GN’R’s Use Your Illusion

Great White toured with Guns N' Roses, hit the charts, and dissolved in a blur of betrayal and substance abuse. And, just when it couldn’t get worse, they played Rhode Island

A shy kid from Zanzibar helped propel Queen to superstardom. Classic Rock chronicles the extraordinary story of the Queen singer

In the late 80s, unknown musician Matthew Trippe claimed to have replaced Nikki Sixx in Motley Crue. Now the true story of Trippe’s strange life can finally be told

30 million people can’t be wrong: how the Black Album transformed Metallica into metal’s biggest band

Jethro Tull's 21 albums have taken in English folk and baroque instrumentation, plus enough thunderous riffs to keep hard rock fans happy. Here are 10 of their best moments

We rank every song on Def Leppard's multi-platinum classic Hysteria – in order of greatness

Equal parts hooks, hairspray and how-the hell-did-they-get-away-with-that: introducing the glam metallers

Members of Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth and Anthrax look back on thrash metal's watershed year