[A] A very strange question I'm only answering in case any other reader is unaware that the albums my big fan Tyler asks about are all but one reviewed in full and positively at the very searchable robertchristgau.com, an excellent place to find out what I think about lots of stuff though keep reading And It Don't Stop please. Most are full A's, Lamar an A minus, Sly an A plus. A Crow Looked at Me was my number three of 2017 and Billie Eilish's debut was number one of 2019. I don't like the Bridgers much. I intend to prefer the angry to the sad, also the sardonic. I'll give the Bergman a shot and recommend you do the same for Laurie Anderson's A plus Heart of a Dog. (P.S. Started the Bergman. Couldn't get through it. Too wispy and crystalline.)

[A] It turns out that during our just-friends-except-actually-I-love-you phase I gave Carola an extra copy I had of Stage Fright, and when Robertson died that was the album she asked me give a spin. Hadn't played the Band in years so I said sure but only thought it sounded good-not-great. For me that's par. I think it's more about the singer(s) and maybe the groove than the songwriter(s), but except for The Band they've never made an album I really, as we used to say, dig--although four others were B plusses, which is no kind of pan. Also, I've always thought Robertson was more a self-important roots-pop middlebrow than the font of wisdom he was widely taken to be, including by himself. If I have time before I file this I'll try to replay Moondog Matinee--find that's the one I'm most curious about.

[A] Jazz was my main musical interest during my 1958-1962 college years, where my bebop-to-Coltrane/Coleman preferences were pretty avant-garde although not especially "free" except for Ornette. Between Beatlemania etc. and my critical and romantic partner Ellen Willis, who to put it kindly disliked jazz, I didn't hear much from 1966 to 1969, although by 1969 Sun Ra in particular was luring me back--see this rather crude report from the way-east East Village Slug's, which Willis presumably skipped. By 1970 the JCOA events were combining Sun Ra's style of "free" with more countercultural, hippie-era events on St. Marks Place where I recall Sun Ra's band participating or even starring. But ultimately I am a rock critic, which means songs with good lyrics, catchy tunes, and a propulsive beat are my meat. Sorting through the inspired and indeed visionary mess of Sun Ra's catalog would require more time, expertise, and indeed inclination than I have. That said, I clearly should play Lanquidity for Carola sometime. I bet I'd learn something.

[A] Raised born-again Christian and officially "saved" for a spell in my early teens, I've called myself an atheist since I was 17, a development I go into some detail about in Going Into the City. Needless to say, however, I could be wrong--maybe there is a God of some sort. It's also conceivable I'll be prey to existential terror as death approaches. That said, I find it very hard to believe Christian hymns, especially by Elvis Presley, will provide succor. Maybe Willie Nelson's Last Man Standing or A Beautiful Time--my mother-in-law listened to Stardust on repeat in her final weeks. Carola has long since nominated Dusty Springfield's "A Brand New Me" as a way of rethinking eternity.

[A] Before I forget, let me recommend David Cantwell's excellent Haggard biography The Running Kind, which will probably speak to your needs better than I can. Because the fact is that I never quite grokked Haggard even though I could recognize his musical skill set, historical importance, and progressive affinities. My disconnect partly but by no means entirely reflects the time I watched him vituperatively badmouth his female stagemate at the Felt Forum circa 2006 or so, which shocked both Carola and myself so much we never forgot it. But it also reflects my personal and idiosyncratic response to his singing as opposed to songwriting, which is that there are lots of country singers I'd rather hear: Jones, Williams, Parton, Frizzell, Lynn for starters. That said, of the three rather different Haggard Capitol best-ofs on my shelves, Hag: The Best of, Vintage Collection, and The Capitol Collectors Series, I figured I'd go for the first-named, which sounded quite OK at breakfast this morning but not as masterful vocally as Lefty's Look What Thoughts Will Do, which followed. Note too that my immediate response to your query was to think of Working in Tennessee, cut when Haggard was in his seventies and sounded it. Might be worth your time.

[A] Now that you mention it, nope. Weird for such a hit machine, isn't it? Out of curiosity I just replayed 1975's Rock of the Westies, which sounded all too here or there, although I liked it a lot when it first surfaced (which is how it came to pass that I wrote the Elton piece in the first Rolling Stone Illustrated History). Liked the Rocketman flick, though.

[A] I review more jazz than most rock critics, but these days that's mostly to come to closer terms with my own musical history--looking back, my collegiate jazz fandom in an era when Dartmouth's WDCR played pop only on Saturday nights, many of which I spent road-tripping to NYC, distinguish me mightily from the slightly younger cadre of folk-soaked rockcrits who graduated college circa 1966 rather than 1962 like me. So I feel no obligation to play much less review the contemporary jazz albums that randomly come my way, which is not to say I never do. I'm inclined to respect rather than love Lacy and presumably have caught him gigging once or twice, but can report no relevant musical details on his albums except that I at least A-shelved Lacy and Mal Waldron's 1991 Hot House--that is, thought enough of it to keep to keep it in reach among my thousands of CDs. I'll try to play it at dinner tonight and will let you know how that turns out. (Report: I wasn't much impressed. Carola enjoyed it without much telltale kvelling.)

[A] There was a late-'70s, pre-Nina moment when--sparked by Harvey Pekar, who we knew about via our Cleveland pal Ray Dobbins and Carola was one of the first to give national coverage--when both of us got interested in comics with the Hernandezes high on our list. I withdrew, I think, mostly because the oeuvre was so vast it was hard to get your mind around. But for sure I'd rate them artists at least as major as some contemporary novelists I'll decline to name.

[A] Having awarded Reed, Velvets included, with 17 A albums, "disdain" seems like quite a stretch to me. What's up with me as regards the "decadent" '70s Reed that Berlin and Transformer epitomized is that I think most rock "decadence" is asshole BS aesthetically--a cheap pass at a putatively arty "seriousness" that as a wholesome ex-Christian boy I believe romanticizes not to mention valorizes dysfunction. See the notorious Lester Bangs convos of that period, which bear out these prejudices--Reed was quite the jerk in those days. Although I liked some of his slighter '70s albums, and admired Metal Machine Music's chutzpah without pretending I was itching for a replay, I didn't warm to him again until his domestic Blue Mask/Legendary Hearts/New Sensations trilogy of the early '80s, although I caught a live performance of Berlin circa 2007 that I thought was OK. See "Lou Reed, Average Guy" in my Grown Up All Wrong collection for more, of which there's plenty. And I'm sorry I didn't squeeze the obit I wrote the day he died in front of the Bowie obit in Is It Still Good to Ya?

[A] Werner my old colleague, acquaintance, and Pazz & Jop voter, bless you. I'm proud indeed that you feel so strongly about these matters, and proud as well to have decided long ago that journalism was as likely a venue as fiction in which I might write entertaining, distinguished, mayhap even literary prose, especially since I was so bad at making shit up. I'm also proud to have transferred such values to the supposedly crude musical genre I made my journalistic lifework. But underlying both these points of pride is my belief in something deeper: democracy. And has become all too clear in the Trump years, democracy is gravely endangered. Can it be saved by journalism of the Carl Bernstein ilk alone? Of course not. But is Bernstein's kind of fact-finding risk, luck, and labor essential to its salvation? You know it. All I can do over in my neck of the woods is bang that gong a little.

[A] Amen to that. You always forget people when you assemble life lists off the top of your head--like for instance Taj Mahal, prominently featured in the June CG--and while I wouldn't say Lynn's voice shows no signs of wear in the two fine albums she made in her eighties it comes close enough. Anyway, the illusion of youth isn't the point. Artistic vitality is the ticket, and she was a wonder.

[A] Aware that I'd let her passing pass, I've wondered about this myself. But without question Franklin-Prince-Bowie were all deeper and more aesthetically momentous. Were/are you a big Tina fan? Of what, exactly? First successful Black female rock artist, check. As such, however, very showbiz. Also as such, better than the Foo Fighters but not Nirvana or arguably Meshell Ndegeocello either. Absolutely I'm glad she escaped Ike, and glad too that she got richer without him. He was a beast. But he was also a genius going back to Jackie Brenston's 1951 rock and roll precursor "Rocket 88," and I'm not convinced she remained as complex and singular an artist without him. When Etta James died, my longtime admiration flowered into something richer and more complex. So far that's not happening with Tina.

[A] There are fine albums I'll never hear again if I live to 100. If you've admired and enjoyed (and own) as many albums as me, that's just the way listening is. Of your two examples, DiFranco is much the less consistent--you could look it up. But she's also the one I'd be more likely to pull out, because her evolving feminism remains complex and provocative (or so I believe without doublechecking). This is why I often resort to what I call the blind pull from my shelves. Most recent winner: Sarge. Sounded good-not-great.

[A] As someone who dislikes the inflated grandiosity and pseudoclassical pretensions of metal, I agree that all these albums generate the kind of emotional power metal aspires to without, Steve Albini's Big Black excepted, giving off a telltale whiff of arrogance. As a grouping it makes sense, and it's gratifying to infer that it helps get you through your endangered days. Thanks for writing.

[A] First of all, this is an apples-and-oranges comparison. Carl Bernstein saved the republic. All I did was save Tin Pan Alley for the Ramones and James Brown, which was far more "inevitable" in any case than I was. But if I had an angel it was editor-turned-publisher Clay Felker, who when I was already 23 gave me a spec assignment that turned into "Beth Ann and Macrbioticism," the best piece of narrative journalism I'd ever write and my ticket to a living that flowered into a short-lived "Secular Music" column at Esquire and took decisive shape when Felker bought The Village Voice in 1974 and made me the kind of music editor he had no idea was coming. For more, check out the obit I wrote for the National Arts Journalism program's ARTicles in 2008.

[A] Let me straighten out a few of numerous misconceptions. As I've said many times, I don't have time for podcasts because I use my ears for music, pretty much nonstop unless I'm watching TV with my wife. Who, how about that, was the person who uttered the supposedly Paul-targeting question I included in the Lennon obit I crushed out on a tight deadline in the seven-eight hours after he was murdered. To quote: "Why is it always Bobby Kennedy or John Lennon? Why isn't it Richard Nixon or Paul McCartney?" Which after all these years I'm still apparently obliged to point out was not to equate McCartney with Nixon much less wish McCartney dead but to throw up her hands at the dire psychology of assassination, which I then attempted to explicate. As for women leading some U.K.-based, academia-mottled, feminist revision of Beatles history, maybe I'll pay attention when it comes from someone smarter than those quoted in the ramshackle piece of arts-page filler you linked to. More Beatles scholarship is always welcome--for sure they weren't perfect human beings. But it's highly unlikely any of it will be as rich as Rob Sheffield's superb 2017 Dreaming the Beatles, which explicates in fond, awestruck detail how crucial and perceptive the teenaged girls who made the Beatles famous were. In this connection I also recommend Robert Zemeckis's 1978 flick I Wanna Hold Your Hand, a Beatlesless Beatles movie that focuses on their female fans. And I'll note that one of the women the Guardian piece features grew up in Cleveland, where early on the Plain-Dealer hired a female rock critic who preceded Paul Williams, Richard Goldstein, Jann Wenner, me, and everybody else. Her name was Jane Scott, she hung in there till 2002 when she turned 83, and what really hooked her was the first time she covered the Beatles. A long time ago she wrote about them a lot.

[A] The one name you left out of your reasonable query and the bluesman I play most often is the gentle Mississippi John Hurt, who has four reviews on my site including an A plus that hasn't proven the one I grab, though now maybe I will (sounded good, natch). The ones I've liked best are the early Avalon Blues and the very late Last Sessions, now part of a Vanguard threefer. Checked out Blind Willie McTell some after Dylan wrote his song of that title and found him less than compelling. I like Gary Davis but have never felt the need to parse his catalogue, which is rather large in part because he settled in Queens and was an NYC folkie favorite. I've never written about Robert Johnson because he's a titan with such a complex story that doing it right would require weeks of listening and comparing as well as reading and rereading. But I play him fairly often--let the record show that my housemate never says no to a blues record. In this connection I recommend Elijah Wald's Escaping the Delta, which makes a point of Johnson's debts to the pop blues of the mid '30s. Also recommend Brother Robert by Annye C. Anderson, a retired schoolteacher who was 92 when the book came out in 2020. She was really a stepsister, but she did spend serious time with him as a girl in Memphis.

[A] I've obviously written about many variants of "world" music over the years, but just as obviously African musics have long predominated, and why that should be is obvious too--as an American music fan who grew up on rock and roll with a minor in jazz, I have a special feeling for music mostly developed by the African-Americans who far more than any other ethnic group have turned American pop into an international music. And then I can go further--the defining secret of African-American music although hardly its only strength or attractive usage is rhythmic, and even though there's enormous variety among the countless pure and also hybrid Afropop substyles, almost all ride their own uncountable grooves and subgrooves. Why it is I can feel and respond to so many of these grooves I don't know; as I've said many times, I'm not much of a dancer. But apparently I do. And be it Brazil or China or the Balkans or, well, the Pacific, no other culture is likely to provide that kind of aesthetic payback even though I often enjoy those musics too. So if I find an easy way to to hear Eddie Lund I'll give him a shot. But it seems doubtful he'll change my musical life in any material way.

[A] I expect there are a lot of omnivorous readers who are nothing special as editors, but let me see what I can patch together. To start I'd say that you have to respect and if possible empathize with the writer's intentions except when they're patently wrong-headed or ethically objectionable--I once assigned a Yellow Magic Orchestra review to a writer who thought it would be funny to transpose all the L's and R's and stormed off for good when I told him rather sharply that it wasn't, but subtler and often unintentional racial, gender, and other stereotyping is a commoner problem. You should reread as carefully with the writer once you've marked up a piece as you did the first time alone--which means, that's right, that if you can't be in the same room as the writer you can at least edit on the phone rather than by email. Be on the lookout not just for clichés but for stronger or more interesting language, and if you see a joke by all means suggest it. If an idea cries out for development talk that possibility through. Double-check any fact that you're not sure is accurate. Brevity is always a virtue, and when you need to cut for space take a careful look at the lead, which will often include some throat-clearing. On the other hand, if you need to cut for space don't be afraid to cut a word here and shorten a clause there--that stuff adds up. When you need an ending reread and try to find a phrase or thought that could stand some reiteration--that echo effect can do wonders. And oh yeah, reread Strunk & White. It's not scripture. It's not even always right. But it will always sharpen your thinking a little.

[A] You romanticize what my reviewing work is like. Painful life crises or competing entertainments aside, I play music every minute I'm home or out alone with my headphones. But note that playing it means I'm hearing it not that I'm listening to it. In fact, for music I'm hearing to catch my ear so that I concentrate on it and listen carefully is fundamental to how I make judgments. That music inspires attention is my first clue that it may be worth writing about, because usually that means I'm enjoying it. Then I try to concentrate and find out how that grabs me. Then I find out how it holds up to repetition. And somewhere in there I start to concentrate on and isolate and maybe analyze my degree of interest or pleasure, gradually getting a grip on its skill or substance or beauty or energy or lyrical acuity or any combination of the above. And sometime in that phase comes the work phase you imagine where I say to myself you're the dean now nail this one. Except that whether or not I'm the dean is usually irrelevant. I'm just a critic, doing what critics do. Which is a fun job as jobs go.