Just look at who’s won the most-coveted Grammy, album of the year, over the past three-plus decades. Or really, look at who hasn’t: Beyoncé, the Rolling Stones, Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, Mariah Carey, Kanye West, Radiohead, Jay-Z.

What if the Grammy for album of the year — a prize whose responsibility to bottle the zeitgeist is right there in its name — regularly went to recordings that balanced innovation and timeliness in a way that made them widely resonant?

By that measure, I’d argue that album of the year has been handed to the most-deserving artist only three times since 1980. For the other 35 years, I’ve chosen which albums should have won instead, as well as which recordings should have been nominated. There’s some crossover here and there.