This Georgia metal band's most accessible record is this sprawling, 75-minute double album. The edges are smoother and the choruses more pronounced than before, but they're still as marauding and feral as ever. The Yellow disc is more immediate ("March to the Sea" is Fugazi via Rush); Green is artier, stretching filmy guitars across monk-like vocals. It adds up to a thrilling hard-rock epic.

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• Photos: Random Notes

“1999”

“I don’t consider myself a great poet,” Prince told Rolling Stone. “I just know I’m here to say what’s on my mind.” In the case of the apocalyptic party anthem “1999,” he was worried about then-president Ronald Reagan’s foreign policies. The song’s melody is based on a riff borrowed from the Mamas and Papas’ “Monday, Monday,” and Prince originally envisioned the first verse with three-part harmony but later split the vocals between himself and members of the Revolution. Because Warner Bros., with whom Prince was locked in a contractual battle, owned the original’s masters, Prince rerecorded the song and appropriately released that version in 1999.