Hip-hop is known for thought-provoking lyricism, clever wordplay, and innovative musicianship. However, like Rock ‘n’ Roll before it, it’s also a genre with many acts who espouse a hedonistic lifestyle.

Have you ever heard of The D.O.C.? His debut album, No One Can Do It Better, was produced by Dr. Dre and he wrote songs on two N.W.A albums as well as The Chronic. If you’re not familiar with him, it might be because five months after his debut album was released, he was driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol, crashed his car, and destroyed his vocal chords, forever altering the trajectory of his career. D.O.C., however, survived.

Other acts haven’t been so fortunate, including Lil Peep and Mac Miller. Peep died in November 2017, while Mac passed away this past September. Both men were killed by accidental overdoses, leaving their respective families and fanbases overwhelmed with grief and looking for answers. While drugs and alcohol may remain ubiquitous in hip-hop culture, substance abuse has also left an undeniable scar on the lives and careers of many artists.

While many hip-hop acts do use and abuse drugs and alcohol, and talk about it in their music, throughout the history of hip-hop there have been many others who do not. With their demanding travel and recording schedules, ever-diversifying business interests outside of music, and the clarity of thought many artists require to write and create new songs, it’s more common than some fans think for their favorite rappers to eschew drugs and alcohol completely—all without sacrificing their creativity or their edge.

As much as drugs and alcohol are a part of hip-hop history, there’s also a long history of artists speaking about the dangers of their abuse. As early as Grandmaster Melle Mel’s “White Lines (Don’t Do It)” in 1983, rappers have talked about the negative outcomes associated with drug use and the effects of overindulgence in alcohol in their music. Biz Markie spoke about how drugs negatively affected both the dealer and the user in 1989’s “Things Get A Little Easier.” Public Enemy characterized the burgeoning crack cocaine epidemic as a horror movie come to life in “Night of the Living Baseheads.”

Fellow Long Island residents EPMD also included “You Had Too Much To Drink,” which described the dangers of drunk driving, on their sophomore album Unfinished Business. EPMD’s Erick Sermon and PMD traded bars (Parrish’s lines appear in italics), rapping:

So you got in your car

Swervin on the road

There was a cop in the bushes

On radar patrol

The light turned green

And you decided to stop

It turned red

You took off

And got pulled over by a cop

You overdid it homes

You had too much to drink

Similar commentary continued through the ’90s, with acts like Brand Nubian and Nice & Smooth showing how drug abuse affected relationships on songs like “Slow Down” and “Sometimes I Rhyme Slow,” respectively. De La Soul delivered a realistic portrayal of the effects of drug abuse on families with “My Brother’s A Basehead.” On the song, Posdnuos raps:

Brother, brother, stupid brother of mine

Started getting high at the age of nine

Now at twenty-one you’re lower than low

Nowhere to turn, nowhere to go

Through the ’90s and 2000s, rappers peppered anti-drug messages into their lyrics. OutKast’s 1994 debut Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik included the song “Git Up, Git Out” which examined the effect that drugs have on ambition (“Don’t spend all your time tryin’ to get high”), and the message was even more pointed on their sophomore album ATLiens, where Andre 3000 proclaimed his commitment to sobriety on the title track. Meanwhile, even the almighty Wu-Tang Clan saw that the overabundance of drug use in their community was a problem on 1997’s “A Better Tomorrow” where they rapped:

You can’t party your life away

Drink your life away

Smoke your life away

By the time that Wu-Tang song came out, rappers had been talking about sobriety for two decades but not everyone learned their lesson. Detroit emcee Royce da 5’9”–who got his start not long after the release of that very same Wu-Tang song—learned the price of alcoholism years later when it nearly cost him his freedom, his family, his career, and his life.

Royce was charged with multiple DUIs, but the last time he blacked out and woke up with his car crashed into a light pole. That one landed him in jail for a year. Upon his release, he decided to stop drinking for good. Recovering addicts often refer to moments like these as rock bottom, and Royce describes the moment in greater detail on the 2009 song “Shake This” where he raps:

Now picture me falling

All the way to the bottom and I’m laying there calling

“Somebody come help me,” find my strength

To stop drinking this poison, ‘fore I drown my gift

Royce took his last drink in 2012, and he’s been thriving both personally and professionally ever since. He released the deeply personal album, Book of Ryan, this year. In addition to revealing the family trauma that likely contributed to his alcohol abuse and his fear that his young adult son may pick up drinking, Royce also thanked one of his closest friends for putting him on the path to sobriety, the aforementioned legendary Detroit rapper Eminem.

Despite what many of their peers have indulged in, some rappers have continued to shun drugs and alcohol both in his music and personal lives. Tyler, The Creator is an accomplished rapper, producer, musician, and clothing designer who has been outspoken about his choice to be drug and alcohol free without being preachy or judgmental. On the song “Let’s Dance,” he raps:

I don’t smoke kush

I don’t do drugs, I don’t even club

I don’t drink beer

When asked about why he hasn’t had a drink, in an interview with Fantastic Man, he replied “Why haven’t you wrestled a tiger? I don’t know. I just don’t want to drink.” He went on to say “I know that I don’t want to be that drunk guy. But I do know I want to hit a jump on a dirt-bike. I can look at that and say: ‘I want to do that.’ I’ve never seen anyone drunk, like, ‘Damn, I want to be that.’”

Peer pressure, however, is often difficult to overcome. Kendrick Lamar captured this in painstaking detail on the hit single “Swimming Pools” from his major-label debut, good kid, m.A.A.d. city. On “Swimming Pools,“ Kendrick breaks down alcoholism in detail, discussing everything from its generational roots in his family to how it affected him personally:

Some people like the way it feels

Some people wanna kill their sorrows

Some people wanna fit in with the popular, that was my problem

Kendrick has managed to make it out of the deep end and wade towards the highest levels of success, adding a Pulitzer Prize to his list of accolades this year. But he’s just the latest of many rappers through the years who recognized the pitfalls of addiction.

All of these songs serve as a reminder that while drugs and alcohol are often glamorized by the music industry, you don’t need them to have a creative, fun, and fulfilling life. Some of your favorite artists are living proof.