Noel Gallagher, the man who claims to have spent £1 million on drugs in the Oasis days in an era punctuated by biblical 5-day binges, may have put his wildest days behind him, but he still knows how to party judging by reports in the news this week.

Following 3 days of gigs with his new band The High Flying Birds, culminating in an appearance at the Camden Roundhouse, he headed straight to a West End club and embarked on an epic drinking session, racking up a £7k tab before being kicked out at sunrise.

Gallagher wrote on his blog: “Took over a small but perfectly formed nightclub in the West End… We was asked to leave at the crack of dawn with a £7k bar bill!!!!! A proper good effort… Needless to say the last 2 days have been spent on the verge of a nervous breakdown. All good though and it was well worth it.”

The death of Amy Winehouse was a stark reminder of the dangers of drink and drug-fuelled debauchery, but it’s actually quite reassuring to see Noel living up to the rockstar stereotype. One tragic loss of life doesn’t mean we’d be better off with a sanitised celebrity world devoid of substance-abuse, sex tapes and trashed hotel rooms.

Their excesses give us a vicarious thrill, meaning we don’t have to get quite so ludicrously spangled ourselves. They are sacrificing themselves for our benefit. They are the modern-day messiahs, but there aren’t many of them left.

We thought we’d take a quick look back at some of the most infamous celebrity benders of years gone by as a reminder of this proud tradition.

Charlie Sheen is perhaps the contemporary king of the bender. Last year, he was found in a hotel room, naked, ranting and out of his mind, accompanied by a prostitute and a family-size pile of cocaine. A few months later, he was hospitalised after a 36-hour bender involving pornstars and lots more coke. Soon after that, he was fired from Two and a Half Men, and started entertaining the world via Twitter and various bizarre TV interviews. He was recently ‘roasted’ on Comedy Central, and has received a substantial financial settlement from Warner Bros after suing them for unfair dismissal. Sheen’s next move is anyone’s guess. Hot Shots: Part Trois, perhaps? (Don’t forget to check out our Charlie Sheen t-shirts. WINNING!)

Richard Harris, the actor who originally played the part of Dumbledore before his death in 2002, was no stranger to the odd day or 5 of sweet oblivion himself. When he won the best actor award at Cannes in 1963, he was presented with a pair of cufflinks. Less than impressed, and no doubt emboldened by booze, he promptly grabbed the best bit of bling on the stage and, evading security, escaped into the night. On another occasion, after spending the day drinking in a London pub, Harris was kicked out at closing time and decided to board a train. In a less than lucid state, he was then kicked off the train in the dead of night, one thing led to another, and he ended up throwing a rock through someone’s window. The owner of the property came out, realised who Harris was, and invited him in for a drink. The binge eventually concluded 4 days later.

He’s now off the horse and no longer drinks (well, apart from water, tea, wheatgrass smoothies and the like) but Russell Brand was, at one stage, a leading exponent of the bender. The way he tells it, his life was pretty much one long binge, but one incident seems to have acquired particular notoriety. When he was at drama school, some unsuspecting boob cast him as Macbeth. In Brand’s own words:

“I took a big load of amphetamines, drank half a bottle of whiskey and staggered out as Macbeth. Before I went on, I tried to get myself in the right mood, so I was smashing stuff up in the back room, cut my hands and tried to make myself puke.

“It was bloody stupid because I was sick everywhere. Some people in the audience thought it was brilliant because they liked that I was intense and mad. The people that ran the drama school said ‘That’s not what we’re after.’”

Fair enough, really.