5 Rock Songs From The Last Decade That Changed Us Forever

Certain songs, melodies, and even only four-to-five-note motifs can define entire peer groups, childhoods, and even generations. The whistled opening line of "Wind of Change" from Scorpions' 1990 album, "Crazy World," captured the precise historical sentiment following the fall of the Berlin Wall the year prior. Nothing as historically momentous as that has happened since 2015, but the zeitgeist and its fractured pockets of unshared interests have more or less taken notice of certain songs, particularly of the rock variety.

That being said, "rock" nowadays isn't the same thing as it was half a century ago. Long gone are the days of Led Zeppelin, Bob Seger, and Creedence Clearwater Revival, all the way through Nickelback in the early '00s. Also absent from 2015 to 2025 are a slew of early 21st-century mega-hits like "Mr. Brightside" by The Killers (2003), "Seven Nation Army" by the White Stripes (2003), "Best of You" by Foo Fighters (2005), "Uprising" by Muse (2009), "Lonely Boy" by The Black Keys (2011), "Take Me to Church" by Hozier (2013), and many more songs that all but the dead noticed. Some of these tracks are squarely "rock," composed by trios or quartets playing guitar, drum, and bass, while others bridge genres and incorporate elements of dance, blues, folk, metal, R&B, pop, and more. 

But in all cases, impact has to include popularity, by definition. And while each reader is going to recall music that means a lot, individually, certain songs from 2015 through 2025 moved the general public in ways that others didn't. This includes, but isn't limited to, "The Less I Know the Better" by Tame Impala, "Square Hammer" by Ghost, "Believer" by Imagine Dragons, "Zombie" by Bad Wolves, and "The Summoning" by Sleep Token.

Tame Impala's "The Less I Know the Better" might sit on the cusp of rock and pop, but it's got just enough non-synth instruments to satisfy purists (including its main bass lick). The insanely hooky, floating, falsetto-driven track blew up in 2015, and the song now sits with over 2 billion listens on Spotify. 

Tame Impala's success didn't come out of nowhere, though. The road of blended, band-based dream pop happened in the mid-2000s with colossal releases like MGMT's ultra-catchy "Oracular Spectacular" (2007), Empire of the Sun's otherworldly "Walking on a Dream" (2008), and extends to lesser-known acts like Blonde Redhead and Broken Bells. Tame Impala's first album, "InnerSpeaker," came out in 2010 and was more of a dirty-mixed, psychedelic Britpop homage than anything else. By the time 2015's "Currents" came out, Tame Impala had switched gears, but carried a built-in audience. And by "Tame Impala," we of course mean Kevin Parker, the one-man Aussie behind the whole project.

But perhaps most critical to understanding the success of "The Less I Know the Better" is TikTok, which itself is emblematic of the age. The track is one of the first that TikTok really helped launch into the stratosphere, a trend that's continued to the present. Launched in 2016 in China and globally in 2018, TikTok played an enormous role in buoying the popularity of "The Less I Know the Better" via song snippets used as background tracks for videos. At the time of writing, over 56 million TikToks have been made using #tameimpala and featuring "The Less I Know the Better." Then there was the video, which definitely caught people's attention, if only because it wasn't what anyone expected. 

Who could have predicted that a guy wearing pope costumes (amongst others), white Halloween face paint, and singing in the most ultra-nasal voice ever, would have taken off? But despite the nasality, accusations of "satanic!" hurled at Ghost, and the seemingly niche nature of their spooky, '80s tribute shtick, the band completely took off with 2016's "Square Hammer." Yes, they had fans going back to their debut, 2010's "Opus Eponymous." Yes, 2015's Meliora blew up in a big way thanks to "From the Pinnacle and the Pit" and "Cirice," monstrous bangers with extremely memorable videos (especially the former) and riffs (especially the latter). But it was "Square Hammer" — a single off their post-Meliora EP, "Popestar" — that cinched Ghost's fame and acclaim. Their latest album, "Skeleta," has sold more vinyl than any rock outfit since 1991.

Despite the outer veneer of silliness, costumes, and characters, Ghost's appeal is surprisingly simple and equally broad-reaching: It's just well-written music with retro flair. In a very real way, Ghost illustrates the opposite of Tame Impala, that straightforward songcraft can still win the day, rather than virality. Ghost is easily the most firmly, OG "rock" out of any group in this article. 

A big part of Ghost's success comes from the band's elusive frontman and creative lead, Tobias Forge. In an interview with Slug Mag, he described taking influence from bands like KISS, Twisted Sister, Motley Crue, and Wasp as a kid. "My older brother ... gave me those records and it just went from there." "From there" meant into death metal and black metal, which is where he picked up Ghost's aesthetic. Somehow, it all came together to forge a modern-day rock mainstay.

At this point, it's all but impossible to imagine the rock and pop landscape without "Imagine Dragons." Numbers do tell the tale in this case: 56 million monthly listeners on Spotify (37th in the world), 160 billion total streams and the equivalent of 74 million albums sold (as of July, 2023), a list of award wins and nominations longer than your arm, and stadium after stadium sold out to crowds who know every single word of every single track. Elevated by extremely singable, rousing hooks and uncluttered instrumentation, Imagine Dragons has reached the absolute apex of modern, accessible rock. This was already the case by the time 2017's "Evolve" came out. But it's "Believer" off that album that proved to be the band's most successful track, and it's most emotionally stirring song.

Yes, the chorus to "Believer" is catchy, and yes, the video features an extremely memorable boxing bout between Imagine Dragons' lead singer, Dan Reynolds, and Rocky's once-superhuman competitor, Dolph Lundgren. But that would all be window dressing without the song's lyrics, which are what made a lasting, widespread impression. The song talks about a hard and necessary truth, that pain is a superb teacher. As Reynold's wrote, and plenty of folks in stadiums have sung, "Pain! You made me a, you made me a believer, believer." 

"Believer's" lyrics were a great topic of discussion when the song was released, with many taking them as indicative of a childhood father-son struggle. Reynolds, however, told People in 2017 that the song is about his battle with Ankylosing spondylitis, a type of spinal arthritis. That doesn't stop "Believer" from meaning different things to different people, though — different meanings that bring them all, ultimately, together.

The last thing that people expected to hear on January 15, 2018, was that beloved Cranberries lead singer Dolores O'Riordan had died. The absolute, wasteful loss of O'Riordan, her voice, and her words reverberated through anyone who'd heard her sing, especially those who knew "Zombie." It's a tremendous understatement to call "Zombie" merely a "hit." When it was released in 1994, it overwhelmed the airwaves, MTV, and the soul alike, especially thanks to O'Riordan's keening, yodel-like vocal flips. While many took the song solely as descriptive of the Troubles in Ireland (1968 to 1998), O'Riordan's "Zombie" was also meant generally to refer to the tapestry of life: "births, deaths, war, pain, depression, anger, sadness," per Songwriting Magazine.

Fast forward to 2018, and hard rock/metal outfit Bad Wolves released what was originally meant to be a cover of "Zombie," but which transformed into a tribute to the then-rececently deceased O'Riordan. Tommy Vext headed up vocals on a somber, piano-rich version of the track, complete with a gold-painted woman who resembled O'Riordan's look in the original "Zombie" video. Instead of O'Riordan singing on the track as planned, the band donated $250,000 of the money they earned from the song to O'Riordan's children.

Bad Wolves' tremendous generosity was matched by an outpouring of love and sympathy from both professional musicians and members of the music-listening public. It was as though everything that O'Riordan had given to people through her music came back after her death. On this merit alone, Bad Wolves' rendition of "Zombie" stands as a cultural touchstone that reminded people of the power of the original song, the power of deeply meaningful music in general, and introduced the Cranberries and O'Riordan to a new generation.

This choice is going to ruffle some feathers, if only because Sleep Token's music is so hard to define. But honestly, does anyone know what Sleep Token is? At times crooning about sex and relationships through an R&B glaze, at times synthy pop, and at times metalcore full of chugs and breakdowns, Sleep Token remains "rock" enough. Back in 2023, when they released "The Summoning" off of their third album, "Take Me Back to Eden," Sleep Token absolutely blew up overnight. They became a masked-and-costumed, completely left-of-field musical choice that bound lovers of diverse musical stripes into one unified fandom. But at the core of the band still sits four people playing instruments: Vessel, II, III, and IV.

"The Summoning," supported by fellow tracks "Chokehold" and the album's self-titled track, "Take Me Back to Eden," ignited a rabid, devoted following amongst the public. No doubt the band's compendium of lore — based on Vessel being an emissary of the god, Sleep — helped deepen their mystique, foster a sense of depth to their music, and generate tons of fodder for online discussions. But this focus on appearance also drove the non-Sleep-Token-loving public further away. Critics label them as boring, superficial, prissy, overly theatrical, inauthentic, overhyped, and very much not metal despite looking like it. 

No matter what side of the fence the reader falls on, or somewhere else entirely, it's impossible to deny that Sleep Token appeals to lots and lots of people — they've got almost 6 million listeners a month on Spotify. Pulling back and viewing our entire musical landscape, it's at least true that the landscape would be less rich for Sleep Token's absence.

Quite a few factors went into making this list of five rock songs from the last decade (2015 to 2025) that changed the face of music forever. Firstly, we strictly adhered to the decade-long time range despite many worthy, impactful songs coming out shortly before 2015. Then, we looked to popularity and quantity of listens, without which there is no broad impact. 

After that, we allowed for a flexible definition of "rock," which refers to everything from traditional takes on band-based music, like Bad Wolves, to more outré, genre-spanning styles, like Sleep Token. Then, we cast a wide net to span the decade, chronologically. This approach helps capture broader social movements and moments over time, like the interplay between "The Less I Know the Better" and TikTok (and social media's role in the music industry, writ large) or the death of Dolores O'Riordan that same year. 

On that last point, the key criterion underpinning these song choices is irreplaceability. Song selections had to have a long-lasting, unique impact on a musical landscape that could have only been supplied by the one song, artist, and epoch in question. In the case of Imagine Dragons, the band's success prior to the release of "Believer" allowed the song's message to be heard when it might not have otherwise. No other band fills the musical need that Ghost does — '80s throwback rock vis-à-vis costumed stage pageantry. Sleep Token's "The Summoning" represented, and represents, the cutting edge of genre-defying rock. But in all cases, each song had to have some unifying effect on members of the public and demonstrate some universal truth about music and its role in our lives.