Fifty of the most drug-drenched albums of all time

Here is another fabulous list of important records, this one organized around the theme of "most drug-addled." As with the avant-garde list, this author's choices are ripe for debate. The writing on the entries is also fun.

RAMPANT MADNESS, cheap powder, and the whiskey river: below are the 50 most debauched, sodden, and certifiable records in music history.

The rules are simple: being merely eccentric while swathed in outlandish clothing fails to qualify. Having done an epic amount of street powder while getting handjobs in the groupie van is not enough. Hell, Steven Tyler claims to have spent $3 million on cocaine over the years, but would Aerosmith have sounded one iota different if theyd been straight edge? Its the same reason Mtley Cre doesnt warrant space on this list. Sure, they snorted live ants (actually, that was Ozzy) and mainlined Jack Daniels to stave off epic boredom, but their music would have been exactly the same steaming pile of hair regardless.

No, to make this list, the music on a given album has to bleed chemical influence while also leaching a very specific brand of desperation and/or madness. The vocals, the rhythm, the melodyall have to be drenched in reverb, compression, and frighteningly altered states that could not have been recorded any other way.

Except through a blind leap into the void. Roll it, pour it, cook it, crush it, or just get stone-cold crazy; the needle will drop into the groove either way.

But excess is never enough.