By now you’ve no doubt scratched a runway into your forehead trying to make sense of “The Definitive 200,” a list of the “top 200 albums of all time.” Issued by the National Association of Record Manufacturers and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, this stupefyingly wrongheaded document seems an attempt to remind us all that the album format is still viable in this age of 99-cent downloads. But it shoots itself in the foot with such incomprehensibly incompetent rankings that the whole thing is just one big embarrassment.

This is one instance in which the phrase “There’s no such thing as bad publicity” is proven false, because it’s hard to come away from this puzzling train wreck. New York Daily News critic David Hinckley says that the first goal of such lists is to start arguments. I don’t know that I agree with that, but in any event, this list isn’t going to start many arguments, because I doubt there’s a person alive who agrees with it, including the roomful of chimpanzees banging on typewriters who dreamed it up.

(I take that back—producer Mutt Lange probably doesn’t take issue with it, since he comes out looking pretty good: AC/DC’s Back in Black scores a respectable No. 17, Def Leppard’s Hysteria and Pyromania chart at Nos. 36 and 86, respectively, and his wife Shania Twain’s Come on Over is lodged at a mind-boggling No. 21. But besides him? No one.)

Things start out predictably enough, with the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (yawn!), Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, Michael Jackson’s Thriller, Led Zeppelin’s Led Zeppelin IV and U2’s The Joshua Tree in the top five, with the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main Street, Carole King’s Tapestry, Bob Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited, the Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds and Nirvana’s Nevermind rounding out the top 10.

But after that, there are so many atrocities and perversions of common sense that one scarcely knows where to start. Let’s hnot even address the obvious omissions (like the fact that the Replacements don’t make the cut and yet Boston’s debut album is No. 43) and merely focus on the order of these 200 entries. Herewith, our top 10 “WTF” moments:

1. Shania Twain Come on Over (No. 21) outscoring Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On (No. 38)

2. Led Zeppelin’s self-titled debut (No. 165) is forced to the back of the bus, behind Faith Hill’s Breathe (No. 76) and Will Smith’s Big Willie Style (No. 154)

3. The Clash’s London Calling coming it at No. 96—one spot behind Creed’s Human Clay

4. Kid Rock’s Devil Without a Cause (No. 68) just beating out George Harrison’s All Things Must Pass (No. 69)

5. Steely Dan’s Aja buried at an insulting No. 191—way behind Ozzy Osbourne’s Blizzard of Ozz (No. 153) and Stone Temple Pilots’ Core (No. 167)

6. Dylan’s Bringing it All Back Home limps in at No. 195 — Sure, I can see how Phil Collins’ No Jacket Required (No. 74 — Just ahead of Metallica’s Master of Puppets, no less) and Kenny G’s Breathless (No. 107) are far superior …

7. The ignominy of Radiohead’s OK Computer shamefacedly crawling in at No. 111, behind Celine Dion’s Falling Into You at No. 97

8. Doesn’t everyone agree that Usher’s Confessions (No. 67) is five albums better than Van Morrison’s Moondance (No. 72)?

9. She’s fine and all, but how does Jewel’s Pieces of You (No. 64) leapfrog fourteen spots ahead of John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme (No. 78)?

10. Speaking of fourteen-spot leaps: In what universe is Neil Young’s Harvest (No. 98) left to pick up Linkin Park’s sloppy seconds, with Hybrid Theory headbanging its way to No. 84?

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