"Nicotine, Valium, Vicodin, marijuana, Ecstasy and alcohol/C-c-c-c-c-cocaine." With those words, Josh Homme introduced excess to a metal landscape lousy with mook thumb-suckers. Weaving the stoner rock of Homme's old band Kyuss with Blue Öyster Cult evil and scummy garage punk, 2000's Rated R was refined stuff. Homme sang surreal lines like "You've got a monster in your parasol" with a smirk, but the riffs were killer (this reissue adds a bonus disc with even-riffier live versions and obscurities). Many winking headbangers owe QOTSA a bump.

“Karma Chameleon”

Boy George has said this song was about standing by what you believe in. However, at the time, he was involved in a secret affair with Culture Club drummer Jon Moss. "Now people can understand the songs better," he said. "They were written about my relationship with Jon, and they were also written about being a gay man in a homophobic world." The lines "If I listen to your lies, would you say/I'm a man without conviction/I'm a man who doesn't know how to sell a contradiction," described his life at the time, he said. "I was selling this big lie."