[A] Three things. First, I don't do any of the tech stuff on my site. Techwise I'm an idiot. So be thankful my webmaster Tom Hull does that work for me and also for you, and if he's late once in a while figure he has more rewarding things to do with his life (plus he's been beset with server problems recently). Second, the Cure I got for better and worse, but if there's a band I think I missed it's the Smiths. Definitely there was more to them than I thought at the time; their failure to make the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is an America-first outrage. Maybe someday I'll have the time to go back and figure them out, but that's a big job of small journalistic utility for anyone but my major fans. Third, that Backstreet Boys album is among other things a showcase for Max Martin, clearly a major genius of contemporary popular music.

[A] I can't notate and am not at all well-schooled in the jazz albums of the '50s and '60s. So I have neither the language nor the frame of reference to write readily about them, plus they lack the news value of recent pop albums, and this is journalism I'm supposed to be doing here. Jazz is hard to write about the impressionistic way I do it. Even with the few artists I've covered often--Davis, Coleman, Rollins--finding the words involves either considerable effort or a stroke of luck. So check out Tom Hull's list if you need some tips.

[A] Like many young critics discovering the satisfying judgmental thwock of a grading system, it took me a while, probably the better part of a year, to get my sea legs and not overstate for effect. Hence the too quickly rated A Salty Dog (such an anomaly that at least two others have asked about it)--which, however, I did revisit later as penance and judged rather better than most Procol Harum albums, in B plus territory though I'm sure not going back and double-checking. In general handing out A-plusses is very tricky business because it's essentially a prediction of continuing future use value. So whoever asked about Arcade Fire's Neon Bible and Graham Parker's Squeezing Out Sparks, right, those were mistakes: Arcade Fire just too grandiose, the sexism of Parker's title song too much to bear. On the other hand, whoever asked about 1970's six A-plusses, well, 1970 was really a hell of a good year. I'd now say all my top eight are A-plus: Layla (though no longer number one), Sly's GH record, Newman's 12 Songs, Moondance, After the Gold Rush, Sex Machine, John's Plastic Ono Band (retrospectively downgraded to an A in 1980, but still a record I pull out with pleasure, so jack it back up), and Aretha Franklin's Spirit in the Dark.

[A] As I was just saying, predicting of future use value is very difficult to do accurately--and that's gotten harder as the number of A albums has increased steadily over the years, rendering the competition for my future non-work listening tougher and tougher. But good for you -- as it happens, all four of the albums you've named are records I return to often, insofar as "often" is a word that makes sense for someone who has what we'll call ten thousand albums crammed into his less than gigantic Manhattan apartment. As for the Beatles, which others have asked about too, let me just say that the UK-US differentiation of their pre-Sgt. Pepper catalogues make that a much more complex question. Nevertheless, I wouldn't be surprised if, after devoting a week or two to the question that no one will ever pay me to do so I won't, I didn't decide most of their albums were A-plusses. That said, no question which two I play most: the U.S.-only The Beatles' Second Album, which I first purchased in 1965, and, yes, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

[A] 1) As with most underground music punk included, I find it more efficient to let the marketplace do some sorting before I get on it. And in Soundcloud rap however exactly you define it I'm not at all impressed by the job the marketplace has done. 2) DIY punk involves minor but telling variations on a simple musical frame I've often compared to blues. Soundcloud rap involves (or anyway, should) beatmaking strategies I'm ill-equipped culturally to feel from the git insofar as they're not raw lo-fi ineptitude/indifference. 3) Soundcloud rap is at least as afflicted as any other kind of hip hop with sexist rhetoric I need very good reasons to hear past. I'm way sick of the word "bitch." I hated the XXXTentacion album in particular and wasted no time mourning his death. 4) Insofar as any new rap is a singles music that's just not what I do as a critic. 5) Cheap production and distribution techniques are one reason why all "death of the album" talk is bullshit. But the sheer profusion of music means much good stuff will get lost.

[A] Right, I don't like Nina Simone. I'd never claim there's nothing there, especially given the heroic status she's gradually accrued. But I don't take to it, and I've given it a bunch of tries, even taught Daphne Brooks's terrific essay on her in her Jeff Buckley book (speaking of artists I don't take to). Simone's default gravity and depressive tendencies (which may be related but aren't the same thing) are qualities I'm seldom attracted to in any kind of art. I've always assumed her classical training--which was extensive; she only started singing in clubs to make money--was connected to my response as well.