The music industry is saturated with songs about love, loss and life’s biggest milestones. There are many artists, though, who choose to use their songs to highlight a different side of the human experience. Whether a glowing endorsement or a cautionary tale of addiction, musicians across all genres have created odes to the world’s most pervasive substances. Sometimes explicit, yet oftentimes hidden behind innuendos and pseudonyms, this list explores a handful of the best songs about drugs.

“Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” by The Beatles

With a song title’s initials that spell out the letters L, S and D, this tune is widely believed to be about the effects of the hallucinogenic drug popular at the time of the song’s creation. Lyrics like “Follow her down to a bridge by a fountain / Where rocking horse people eat marshmallow pies” create psychedelic imagery that is difficult to imagine referencing something other than a drug-induced haze.

“White Rabbit” by Jefferson Airplane 

References to Alice in Wonderland’s magic pills and the fantastical distortions that follow flew over many radio stations’ censorship guidelines at the time of the song’s release. However, these references are easy to connect with hallucinogens if one listens closely enough. The tune’s marching-band-inspired drum beat and repetitive melody create the impression of a seriously altered unconscious mind.

“Heroin” by The Velvet Underground 

In a not-so-thinly veiled narrative of someone indulging in the highly addictive opioid, Lou Reed describes the experience of one who shoots up because “It makes me feel like I’m a man / When I put a spike into my vein.” The tune’s frantic, raw energy warns of the drug’s potential to make the users “good as dead,” yet it can come across as insightful rather than preachy.

“Can’t Feel My Face” by The Weeknd 

This classic pop hit, at first listen, is about the love of a woman, which makes one feel high. However, further evaluation can lead to the conclusion that the woman’s numbing effect is, in fact, referring to The Weeknd’s own experience with cocaine dependence. The song’s true content may be easy to miss behind its upbeat, catchy tune.

“Dancing with the Devil” by Demi Lovato

Lovato wrote this song as an emotional ode to their own battle with addiction, which included a near-deadly overdose in 2018. Serving as the title track for “Dancing with the Devil…the Act of Starting Over,” the song’s powerful vocals warn of how being lured in by “the devil,” or drugs, can lead to the act of gambling with one’s life and soul.

“Crack Rock” by Frank Ocean 

Through a breathy repetition that reflects the voice of a heavy smoker, Ocean details the life of someone who has succumbed to a cocaine addiction. Lyrics such as “Your family stopped inviting you to things / Won’t let you hold their infant” reveal a crack between the man and the people important to him. The song utilizes comparisons between “cracked rocks” or stones and “crack rocks,” referring to cocaine, to reveal how a dependence on the drug has led to the song’s subject splitting up his life.

“Hurt” by Nine Inch Nails

Distorted drumming, choppy guitar and soft vocals add to the disoriented nature of the last song on “The Downward Spiral.” The protagonist poignantly reflects on how his once-familiar coping mechanism of injecting narcotics has led him into an “empire of dirt” that has caused him to let down everyone in his life. The song’s heartbreaking pessimism and misery provide insight into one whose life has taken an irreversible, vicious decline.

“Smoke Two Joints” by Sublime 

A cover of the original version by The Toyes, this version of the tune is joyful and rebellious, incorporating ska and reggae influences to weave the story of a character who regularly and unapologetically smokes marijuana. Released in 1992, this ode to cannabis reflects the band’s rebellious, punk nature without taking itself too seriously.

“Brain Stew” by Green Day

In this song, Billie Joe Armstrong sings about the insomnia and brain fog that came with his dependence on stimulants. Backed by strong guitar riffs, he details “having trouble trying to sleep” and complains of eyes that are “dried up and bulging” and asserts that his mind is “set on overdrive” — all symptoms typical of frequent methamphetamine usage.

“Mary Jane’s Last Dance” by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

Though on the surface about a girl who “grew up in an Indiana town / Had a good-looking mama who never was around,” this harmonica-backed, rhythmic song has long been speculated to refer to marijuana due to its title character’s initials of MJ. The chorus tells of a dance with Mary Jane, who will “kill the pain” and take him away from his small town — a tale that can be thought to reference the relaxing, escapist impact of smoking weed.