[A] I think they suck, and having streamed the new one at least three times without retaining anything but the internet skit will only consider explaining why for a minimum of a buck a word--as I just said, I don't do pans anymore. Congratulations, however, for not calling them a "rock band." Rock bands still oughta, you know, rock (for better or worse--here's to you, Foo Fighters and Queens of the Stone Age). I note as well that you are not from the United Kingdom, the spawning ground of the 1975 delusion. Don't let me stop you--stick to what you believe. But don't kid yourself if you find your faith faltering.

[A] My EMP lectures on Charlie Gillett and Henry Pleasants will appear in the Book Reports collection Duke will publish in April. The one I would have most liked to squeeze into this book is the breakdown of John Mayer's "Waiting for the World to Change," but it didn't fit conceptually. If I ever write a book on the '50s, as some think I should, I'd include a version of the Huey Smith plus incorporating the research I did on both '50s car songs and the class origins of '50s rock and rollers. And the one I did about marriage songs I'd like to preserve in book form too. But for various complicated and not necessarily permanent reasons I don't want to put them on my site yet. Title of this year's scheduled presentation: "All the Time in the World: The Living End in Peter Stampfel and Willie Nelson." Second week of April. Exact coordinates TBA.

[A] Anybody who uses the term "political correctness" so uncritically understands politics differently from me, and I've been referencing it in print since 1979. Of course the right is resurgent, although the pushback in the US has been pretty impressive. But I don't blame that on the "zeitgeist," a vague term long used to justify all kinds of half-baked BS. I blame it on a simultaneously organic and well-plotted counterattack by the rich on the rest of us. If the rich win, which is certainly not impossible, that won't be "the spirit of the times," which is the literal meaning of "zeitgeist." It'll be the boot coming down. Here's hoping you're into sneakers.

[A] Having noted that I love Tom Hull's plain site design because it privileges the written word and have no interest in overseeing or indeed countenancing a "lively" chat room gone mega, I will observe that the word is "commenter," not "commentator," and that the only other person ever to spell it "Greel" here har har is the suddenly silent Coco Hannah Eckelberg. I assume that "she" was offended when I failed to answer "her" ignorant question about the Amazon land grab near where "she" supposedly lives. Coco and Chadwick? Could they be the same "lively" "commentator"? Do "she" and "he" have anything to do with the radio show I redacted? Were I more up-to-date we could speculate for weeks. I'm so glad we won't.

[A] Absolutely I update it all year long. Otherwise I'd miss stuff out of sheer carelessness at year's end. So I keep a roughly ranked list all year and then start doublechecking on its rather intuitive rankings starting in November, fine-tuning constantly till I'm ready to post it somewhere, usually (always? don't recall offhand) robertchristgau.com in the post-Voice years. I pay special attention to the top 10, of course. Some version of all that stuff for 2018 should appear somewhere sometime soon.

[A] I hated doing the Turkey Shoot. People think critics enjoy panning stuff, and I guess in special circumstances we all do, plus some spiritually impoverished souls are just built that way. But to do it my way I had to immerse, spending weeks and weeks of autumn listening to records I didn't like until I began to actively hate or disdain them--not everything I covered there, there were always a few regretful ones, but most. As a result, I was often marginally depressed in November. I kept doing it because it served a journalistic function for the lead critic of an important pop-music publication. But when I got there I was happy to leave it behind--my tour at MSN Music had a different shape and weight. Sometimes I found it hard enough to isolate the one Dud a month there to keep me and MSN honest.

[A] I think you mean are there good songs that don't have hooks, as of course there are, although a groove and even a texture can function as a hook, which I take to mean any sound you just love hearing again. With groove there are thousands of examples, from half the third disc of JB's Star Time to the less catchy bits of a great Ramones or Motorhead album. Texture is trickier, but start with the sheer sound of Miles Davis's trumpet or Aretha Franklin's voice and then move on to lesser mortals--Mary J. Blige and Patti Smith come to mind. But I don't believe my fondness for the hook is about the need to process quickly. I believe it's the itch-scratching pleasure--which some find annoying or worse, hence the insulting term earworm--of hearing that snatch of melody/rhythm again. And then there's, well, meaning. Is John Prine's "Hello in There" hooky? Not terribly. Did I just pull it up on iTunes as I sat here? Indeed I did, and didn't start to really enjoy it until Prine opened his mouth: "Had an apartment in the city . . . "

[A] As I thought I'd just said in my review of Veins, that would be Kindness for Weakness. Really, folks, this guy is a keeper. A little too blunt rhythmically to qualify as an undeniable classic--all those four-beat lines--but so solid and decent and funny and colloquial and literate and dedicated to getting better. On the new Humble Pi, "Grim Seasons" and "#Neverusetheinternetagain" are standouts in completely different ways, and the first and third of his Aesop Rock Lice collabs are irresistible as well as free to DL. And let me add that he was the only artist to send good wishes to Carola when I wrote about her illness--a kick for her, because he happens to be someone she's always responded to, maybe just because in his educated way he's blunt like The Only Ones heroine-narrator Inez Fardo. Hope he fuels an album or two by hooking up with someone permanently lovable himself. And I'm reminded by the fact that he left law school to become a rapper to offer up a shout-out to the former AD the Rapper: Antonio Delgado, US Representative-elect from the great state of New York.

[A] Although definitely not an audiophile, I so believe music belongs out in the air, in what is at least theoretically a social space, not inside your cranium. I use headphones only at the gym and on the street, where I check out my ever-evolving cellphone Spotify library for possible review. These seldom cost more than 25 bucks and I go through three-four pairs a year--they do break, especially when you're a klutz like me. (I do not use Bluetooth. Maybe I should.) My apartment is equipped with a good but not expensive or high-end sound system I couldn't describe without checking with its designer, my nephew-by-association Perry Brandston, a sound engineer I've known since 1966, when he was nine. I recommend quality speakers to everyone whose computer-streamed music reaches the atmosphere--I have Boses. Sometimes I stream from my personal half-a-terrabyte iTunes library because it's easier physically to locate music there. I seldom play my vinyl--I prefer the convenience of CDs. Finding working CD changers, however, is getting harder and harder. Anybody know somebody in NYC who can do a serious repair on my old Sony DC355, which I assume means a new laser? The lasers do go on these things. I think I'm on my fourth.

[A] Cue to mortarboard-sporting Dean of American Rock Critics jumping up and down with glee and chirping: "They noticed me! They noticed me! Plus they gave me a chance to say something nice about Father John Misty!"

[A] Every Christmas, I climb on a library stool and pull down Billboard's Greatest Christmas Hits (Rhino), Hipster's Holiday (Rhino), The Most Beautiful Christmas Carols (Milan), Ultimate Christmas (Arista), maybe Christmas Party with Eddie G (don't remember the label and am not getting on that stool right now), plus perhaps the Louis Armstrong Christmas album or if I'm feeling puckish the Klezmatics' Woody Guthrie Hanukkah album from the regular shelves. Put them in my changer and hit shuffle as I so seldom do. But pretty soon I'll probably be playing something else. Remember Dabke: Sounds of the Syrian Houran? What nailed that album for me was how well it went over at Christmas dinner with my Jewish friend Laura and her Christian husband Tom, who is the biggest fan of Christmas music I know. Last name: Smucker. Buy his Why the Beach Boys Matter, send him the fan letter he deserves, and maybe he'll provide some "holiday" tips in return.

[A] Depends on how young, of course, but my advice would be to think humor and novelty, preferably uptempo. Pre-Elvis that would start selected Louis Armstrong--"Heebie Jeebies" and "Big Butter and Egg Man," "What Did I Do to Be So Black and Blue" and "West End Blues" if they're older and more opened up--and also Louis Jordan. Or you could try to appeal rhythmically: Glenn Miller's "In the Mood," Count Basie's "One O'Clock Jump." Maybe some Boswell Sisters--"Heebie Jeebies" again plus "Alexander's Ragtime Band." For little kids Bing Crosby's "Swingin' on a Star" is kind of a sure shot. As for pre-Beatles, the problem is that some of the most irresistible stuff is the sexiest--the two great Jerry Lee Lewis hits are off the table. Elvis I'd start "All Shook Up" or "Don't Be Cruel" then "Blue Suede Shoes" even though it's not his song, plus maybe "Hound Dog." The great Little Richards "Tutti Frutti" and "Long Tall Sally" are even filthier than the Jerry Lees but probably over the heads of anybody who's too young for them. Chuck Berry I'd try "Johnny B. Goode," "Maybellene," and "Nadine." Buddy Holly has the right weight--start with "Peggy Sue" and "Not Fade Away," then go soft or hard, "Everyday" or "That'll Be the Day," or as responses suggest. The Bobbettes' "Mr. Lee" is an irresistibly girlish, very upbeat 1957 one-shot about a high school principal that I just discovered I don't have in my iTunes and will download shortly--in a way the first great girl-group record. Speaking of which the Jaynettes' "Sally Go 'Round the Roses" suits every taste. And now I'll stop.

[A] I gave the Solange at least three serious runs--not just plays, multiple immersions: before it was a phenomenon, while its rep was building, and then later when it was many people's album of the year, after which I went so far as to buy rather than just stream. It has never even begun to break through to me--cannot recall a single thing on it (though I do remember that it includes a widely admired song about hair that I found musically uncompelling). So I didn't even get an Honorable Mention out of it, which was my aim when I bought it. I assume its rep isn't just some mass delusion--that there's something there, and that it has to do with black female identity. But it left me unmoved, indeed untouched, and I'm not gonna lie about it. Not so crazy about Jay and Bey's duet album either.

[A] As with Solange, there was a three-part process. Blackstar had great Bowie's-back word of mouth from the git, and I was on it as soon as it was streamable. Then he died and of course I listened some more, though the great discovery of the Noisey obit I wrote were the more Eno-ish sides of Low and "Heroes." And then it won Pazz & Jop and I went back to it again. Got zero each time. Difference from Solange is that I'd been complaining about his melodramatic chanteur affect for something like 40 years by then--which assuming you're a Francophone probably sounds pretty natural to you. Solange, in contrast, is right down my alley--lyric-conscious African-American feminist, who could ask for anything more? In both cases I came out with zilch. I should add that it got a fourth pass when Rob Sheffield's superb Bowie book came out, which was well before the year ended. Played Station to Station not long ago, however, and it sounded as great as ever.

[A] I've been silent about him because his albums aren't A's for me, and I only go long on A's these days. I find him forbiddingly bland, though I may yet eke out a * or even a ** for his latest, which I've heard on headphones three or four times and don't currently recall the title of. If I was still lead critic somewhere, in particular the Voice, I'd certainly have done a Rock & Roll & on him by now--the whole question of how he relates to women, in his music I mean, is of some interest to me, because I don't think he's the paragon some believe even though so many other male rappers are much worse. And then there's this question of whether he farms out his rhymes, right? Who cares is what I generally think about that stuff.

[A] A tip, folks: great way to get your question answered is to help me promote my books. Ahem. Following Is It Still Good to Ya?--which was just treated to a Toronto Globe & Mail interview, Canadians out there, find it wherever you find books right now--will come April's Book Reports, about half reviews of music history and criticism and the other half not, including that lo-o-o-ng 1985 Raymond Williams appreciation I'm so glad novelist-musician Wilkins admires without claiming it's exactly a fun read--Williams was a titan who had many virtues, but fun-friendly he wasn't. Unfortunately, none of the African novels I've mentioned here and there were ever reviewed by me, although in the '80s I did do a long piece on South African fiction that didn't make the Book Reports cut. As for Dreiser, who I wrote about at some length in my 2015 memoir, Going Into the City, he was rock and roll in several ways, although once again fun wasn't prominent among them. He was avowedly common, so smart about the virtues and foibles of ordinary people without enough money. Moreover, my beloved Sister Carrie centers on a singing star, as Marshall Berman's On the Town explores with his customary depth and heart. And Dreiser's brother was songwriter Paul Dresser, who wrote a major 1890s hit called "On the Banks of the Wabash"--unless, as some believe, Dreiser wrote it himself.

[A] Big question that I will answer partially. I stream all the time. It can't be avoided if you're to review seriously, much less as comprehensively as I do. And for economic reasons I never hear a good portion of my Honorable Mentions any other way. But anything that sounds like a possible A I buy--mostly from Amazon, to my chagrin, though I do sometimes use Amoeba or CDUniverse and check with Bandcamp when appropriate. In my art-friendly nabe the only generalist CD retailer is Barnes & Noble, where the shelves are scanter all the time; at Best Buy the clerks barely know what a CD is (of course, they also barely know one charger from another, or where the air conditioners are). My preference for physicals isn't about audio primarily. It has to do with what I've come to call externality. Streaming creates the illusion--greatly magnified by headphone use, which is another matter--that music is a utility you can turn on and off; the water metaphor is intrinsic to how it works. It dematerializes music, denies it a crucial measure of autonomy, reality, and power. It makes music seem disposable, impermanent. Hence it intensifies the ebb and flow of pop fashion, the way musical "memes" rise up for a week or a month and are then forgotten. And it renders our experience of individual artists/groups shallower. In a promotional 500-worder for the now defunct Borders to help promote Grown Up All Wrong in 1998--which now ends the introductory section of Is It Still Good to Ya?--I wrote about getting to know "musicians themselves, not as they 'really' are, but as they create themselves in music." This year I'm feeling that way about two rather different acquaintances, both from Chicago: Noname and Rich Krueger. The physicals were crucial to that.

[A] Basically I have less than no use for this stuff. Moreover, I think Williams's rationalization speaks poorly of his aesthetic range. As a democrat, I prefer variety, plenitude, and meat and potatoes to delectation. Those Prince piano etudes that someone raved about in Pitchfork a while back sounded like nothing much to me, and though I did play a single-CD distillation of More Blood, More Tracks they sent me--imagined it might be a way to commune with the classics while pretending to work--I thought it was dead on its feet. My buddy Greil, not a guy averse to delectation, dismissed it in Rolling Stone.

[A] To begin, I've failed to find even a * in so many Neil Youngs I was chastised here for it, and right, usually I've tried. But in the case of these two artists, I always listen once and seldom get past twice. So though I don't have the knowledge to answer your question, I would certainly check a compilation out were someone else to give the job a shot. But while I actually respect both these men quite a bit as public figures, including the relationship to music that's a key part of who each of them is, I doubt anyone could extract better than a strong Honorable Mention from either of them.

[A] Many of the best are old, expensive, and hard to find, in part because I've helped make them cult records, probably: Trevor Herman's glorious Guitar Paradise of East Africa comp, for instance, which he failed to license properly and kind of disappeared. But The Rough Guide to Youssou N'Dour and Etoile de Dakar, The Indestructible Beat of Soweto, Franco & Rochereau's Omona Wapi (the four-track Shanachie condensation of the original), the first volume of Ken Braun's Rochereau anthology for Sterns and the second of the Franco (not that both volumes aren't great in each case), Ladysmith Black Mambazo's Classic Tracks, King Sunny Ade's The Best of the Classic Years, Youssou's Rokku Mi Rokka and Egypt, and Oumou Sangare's Worotan seem findable as I write and are all records I'll put on for visiting newbies or casual, who tend to become intrigued. Congotronics 2 and the first Staff Banda Bilili records are post-soukous Kinshasa music that's worth a dip. Get 'em while supplies last. And in addition, a listen to the Riton and Kah-Lo record I just reviewed might make sense. It's slighter than any of the above, but it's also a contemporary fusion that might be a good intro.