(FORTUNE Magazine) – As the '90s come to a close, here's a look back at some of the decade's finest music. (Part two in a series.)

A TRIBE CALLED QUEST The Low End Theory (1991, Jive/BMG): The first track, "Excursions," sets the right tone: This hip-hop milestone is a richly captivating voyage along the border between rap and jazz.

BASIC INSTINCT Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1992, Varese Sarabande): Yes, the music was a lot better than the movie. Eerie and seductive, Jerry Goldsmith's score is a masterpiece of San Francisco noir.

THE BREEDERS Last Splash (1993, 4AD/Elektra): Fast, funny, and joyously hooky, Last Splash captures what "alternative rock" was supposed to sound like before it degenerated into plain-wrap radio mush.

THE VERVE Urban Hymns (1997, Virgin): These English mystics were never afraid to aim high. Every song on Urban Hymns feels like a mondo rock anthem, as massive and airy as a cloud bank sweeping across a desert landscape.

WILLIE NELSON Teatro (1998, Island): Teatro is the music you'd expect to hear in Marlene Dietrich's Mexican saloon in Touch of Evil: ageless cowboy ballads, spiked with tequila and spooked by ghosts of the past.

CHRIS WHITLEY Dirt Floor (1998, Messenger): Having lost his big-deal contract with Sony, Whitley hunkered down in a Vermont barn to unleash this stripped-to-the-bone growl of passion and defiance.