The public generally buys the music they hear on the radio, and so unsurprisingly, the "bats" section reads like a typical playlist you hear day in and day out on all popular commercial radio stations.
The trout section typifies what you can find if you dig around a little and do some research if you are really interested in rock, music, its history and evolution into various styles.
If Elton John and Phil Collins were added to the "bat" list, and it was run on a continuous loop with me strapped to a chair and unable to switch it off, that would be my idea of Hell

Philip, Cop-en-hag-en, Denmark

Perhaps I should be ashamed that the only 2 songs I know of any artist in the critics' list is Perfect Day and Come on Eileen.
I've barely heard of half the list. I do better with the public's list.
I thought Radiohead, Cure, Bon Jovi, Gene, A-ha and The Killers is all anyone needs to know. Now I feel I'm missing out on something....

LP, Brighton,

hmmmm? - Keef in Liverpool - so when Lou Reed wrote on MMM : "To be listened to at maximum volume" was he being ironic? It's unlistenable and it's meant to be, that was the idea.

Bill, Baltimore, USA

I was surprised that you missed out Radiohead's OK Computer from the Trouts list, or whatever The Verve album is called that critics are always raving about. I would say there are a lot of people, non-critics, who like Trout Mask Replica, simply for its drunkening properties. I can't say the same for the others in the list. You get people like Q Magazine, who shun the Red Hot Chili Peppers for being formulaic, and they give Oasis all the praise they can for doing the same thing on each album. It just goes to show that music that sells well because critics rate it highly, usually only does so for that reason-it may be total tedium but if your favourite critic likes it, it's worth buying. If you wanted your own opinion on what an album is like, you would buy it out of your own curiosity, but if that was so, Radiohead would not have sold any records.

Mike, T. Wells, UK

A good music critic could not only compile the Trout and Bat lists, but tell you what the difference is between them from a musical point of view. Does the Trout list have more augmented and diminished chords, while the Bats are filled with primarily major chords and sevenths? Song length? Do people respond better to music in a certain key, or a familiar chord pattern, while critics prefer that which deviates from the familiar?

Bad music critics have to depend on vague intangibles, like "authenticity" and "genuine," because they really have no clue why what they like sounds better to them than what they don't like.

G. Ziemann, Phoenix, AZ/USA

The most important criteria for any music should be melody, not one of the last.

Skwerlmaster, monroe, US

all i can say is that anyone who likes anything made by radiohead after "the bends" is raving about the emperor's new clothes. we all know it sucks, but those who want to be viewed as "elite" go on about how brilliant that garbage is. saying radiohead is still good music makes you not only a music critic but an alien.

Mark, manchester, nh

"I say: 90% of mankind should not be allowed to voice their opinion!"

Well now Jannick, just because 90% of Opinions in Germany are ignored, theres no need to make the rest of us suffer.

Nick, Emsdetten, Germany

Well, the general public is the lowest common denominator, so who cares what it thinks? Give me Beefheart and The Fall anyday.

Pete, Bristol,

This reminds me of the line from Interpol's PDA. "You are the only person who's completely certain there's nothing here to be into"

Where have you gone Lester Bangs, rock n roll nation turns its lonely eyes to you.

Asdrubal, Carthage, MO

WOW only a music critic would love "Tomorrow Never Knows".

Well, I love that, "Only a Northern Song", and "Think for Yourself".

By your rather porous logic, that means I'm a better music critic than you are.

Give me your job.

Kristen Gielecki, Detroit, Michigan

I do think that many music journalists become a little blinkered when reviewing the follow-up to a 'classic' previous album. I think each album should be reviewed at the time on merit and not shaped by what's gone before. A good example recently is Neon Bible which, when you read between the lines of many reviews, journalists were really not sure what to make of it but most seemed nervous about marking it down. It ended up being reviewed about as favourably as Funeral but is it as good an album (?) - well I certainly don't think so and I think few would.

I would urge reviewers to be more subjective in such instances and stop giving artists the benefit of the doubt.

Andrew, Leeds, West Yorkshire

Hmmm, what would you say I was if I said my favourite Beatles tune were Revolution #9?

I have two albums out of that entire list (Beefheart and Reed), and they're good albums to me, just good solid music. Wouldn't try to convert anyone or try to make myself seem important by liking them. In fact, Trout Mask is a singalong album to me.

If you would like to understand what Reed was doing with MMM try turning the volume way down and listening to it that way. I hear it the same way i would listen to a train in a valley somewhere.

Keef, Liverpool, UK

I tried to listen to Trout Mask Replica... I wanted to see what all the fuss was about... I couldn't finish it... It's just not music as I know it...

paulc, gloucester,

The way to spot the music journalist in a crowd of strangers would surely be to listen to the way he or she talks about music:

Is every single word they speak delivered in a quasi-ironic way - the verbal equivalent of the dreaded air quotation marks?

Do they call some artists (using the word 'artist' itself is a dead giveaway actually) by their surnames and others by an embarassing mangling of their first name ('Keef')?

Do they look sheepish and shifty when they're talking about music - as if they know that, no matter how you dress it up, it's really only pop music and not remotely important in the great scheme of things?

Are they generally incapable of making polite conversation and socially inept on the whole?

David Holzer, Palma , Spain

Tony. It is NOT about personal opinion. James Blunt is unmitigated, unforgivable, irredeemable rubbish. This is FACT.

ian, gloucester,

Music journalist, as with most critics, like to think that their tastes are somewhat more refined than that of the man in the street. That this particular man in the street thinks that 'Trout Mask Replica' is one of the greatest recordings ever would cut no ice with a music journalist/critic. In his opinion I would be liking it for all the wrong reasons; my liking of it would not be as 'proper' as his; my liking it would be something of an aberation because, in his eyes, I would not be qualified to like it; not properly. Not like he does. Similarly, because I think that Metal Machine Music should be inserted back up through the orifice from which Lou Reed produced it (along with the rest of his product), a critic would tell me that I simply don't understand it. To this I would reply "Listen to the first Faust album".

I find myself unable to comment on the 'Bat' list.

Chris Marsh, Pontypool, Wales

Bizarre that music journalist, David Sinclair, should miss the acknowedgement of Blunstone's lost classic 'One Year' - while attending the Zombies recent 'Oracle' show. Where is the discerning ear? Where is the sense of history? I expect more from the Times

erperryman, Cwmbran, Uk

I think a lot of these critics grew up during Peel's heyday and just adopted his 'cool' taste. Just because hes was a lovely bloke doesn't mean he could ever recognise a tune. (The Fall, The Slits, Belgian Techno..)
God preserve us from deep sixth-formers with their Ivor Cutler albums.

Gibbo1956, London,

I think quite a few critics would say "Strawberry Fields Forever" instead of "Tomorrow Never Knows" and that few fans would pick "Strawberry" as a fave.

Barry Gutman, Bryn Mawr, PA

Its the same with film critics...redo any baked bean ad with a Polish voice over, subtitle it, and add a sountrack from a Malian harp player, and you've got at least 4 stars right there. Like any profession, music criticism survives by creating fog and celebrating obscurity.

Don Rocin, Bungendore, Australia

I think it's a little misleading to say the public actively hates those albums. It's a bit like saying someone isn't aware of something and therefore hates it.

Michael, Belfast,

The public really hates "Tender Prey" and "The Gilded Palace of Sin"? If so, it's just another reason why the vulgar taste of the masses is irrelevant. I say: 90% of mankind should not be allowed to voice their opinion!

Yannik, Poggenhagen, Germany

WHATartistic intent behind Metal Machine Music? Enlighten me, because I don't know of anyone who has been able to listen to Lou Reed's apparent attempt at career-acide in its entirety on a clear head, much less have the remotest inkling of what it purports to be about.

That said, I own about 3/4 of your Trout list -- and about half of the Bats -- and listen to recordings from both regularly. Anomalous? I doubt it -- I suspect that a large number of collections are like that. The "shared ground" is, I suspect, a far more vast territory than you think, Mark.

Graham, Los Angeles, USA/California

The joy about music is it's ALL about personal opinion; reading the critics is a good way to gauge an album's quality, but not the be-all and end-all. No one person should be allowed a monopoly to say what song is good or bad.

Tony, Oxford, England