There are bands that flirt with the abyss, then there are bands that lick it with a flaming tongue and call it rock. The Scorpions were the latter—a seething brood of German madmen that stormed the ‘70s with platform shoes, bellbottoms, and monster riffs. Before the slick MTV hair days, before the power ballads softened their venom, The Scorpions were raw, weird, and electric. Uli Jon Roth channeled Hendrix through a cloud of cosmic hash, and Klaus Meine howled like a broken siren. These albums were transmissions from a parallel universe where every amplifier goes to 13 and never comes down.

3. Taken by Force (1977)

This is the last gasp of the Roth era, and what a glorious final breath it is. 40 minutes part mystic séance, part rocket launch and all fucking rock! Taken by Force is a schizophrenic masterpiece that rides the lightning between metaphysical poetry and straight-up streetfight rock. “The Sails of Charon” might be the most blistering song ever written about Greek mythology and/or astral projection. Meanwhile, “He’s a Woman, She’s a Man” sounds like it was written in an alley behind a Berlin cabaret by a drunk warlock. The whole thing is a psychedelic karate chop to the solar plexus of ‘70s hard rock.

2. In Trance (1975)

The Scorpions hit the dark artery of emotion here, not just playing music but summoning it from some place deep and disturbed. The title track is a funeral dirge for innocence, while “Robot Man” is proto-metal punk with a death wish. Uli Roth plays guitar like he’s trying to seduce a ghost, and Klaus Meine finally finds the rasp that would haunt arenas for decades. In Trance is the moment the band slipped into a mystic sleaze covered leather jacket and became a dangerous band.

1. Lovedrive (1979)

This is where the fuse hit the dynamite. Roth was gone, and in came Michael Schenker—briefly, brilliantly—like a mad guitar prophet on loan from the gods of overdrive. Lovedrive is leaner, meaner, and soaked in gasoline. “Loving You Sunday Morning” kicks the door open with teeth bared. “Coast to Coast” is a wordless triumph of tone, and “Holiday” is the greatest song ever written about emotional collapse on a beach. Everything here just fucking clicks with meaner riffs, dirtier sex, and deeper pain. The Scorpions stopped floating in the cosmos and crash-landed right into the arena, middle fingers raised and solos blazing. This is the album where they stopped being a cult act and became rock juggernauts we know and love.

The Scorpions were their own twisted church, preaching with distortion and heresy. These albums—Taken by Force, In Trance, Lovedrive—are monuments to a band before compromise, before polish, before the chart success dulled the sting. They are vital. They are feral. And they demand to be played at bone-rattling volume. Listen not because you should, but because your soul might rot if you don’t.