Burn My Eyes by Machine Head

Burn My Eyes, Machine Head's 1994 debut on Roadrunner, sounds like Oakland at boiling point. Colin Richardson produced it, and Robb Flynn's lyrics soak up the social disorder and pressure-cooker tension around the band, with the Los Angeles riots of 1992 and the Waco siege of 1993 feeding straight into the songs. The music is groove metal at its most bruising: Flynn and Logan Mader's guitars grinding and chugging, Adam Duce's bass locked tight, and Chris Kontos, on his only studio album with them, pounding the kit.

The title is lifted from a line in the breakdown of "Old", and "Davidian" is the track rock radio's countdowns keep coming back to. It shipped more than 400,000 copies worldwide, making it Roadrunner's best-selling debut until Slipknot came along.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.