Neutral Milk Hotel: Classic or Dud?

it's funny how much bile and ire NMH inspire from those who don't like them. i think it has to do with the reverence they are often held in by those who do like them. they do attract the kind of fanatical fervour that can irritate the hell out of me when associated with bands that i like, never mind bands i don't get or can't stand. but at least when i come face to face with that fervour i can relate to my own experience and not get too wound up (unless maybe it's over something really shitty) because i do think that Aeroplane is the best album i've ever heard and i've never tired of listening to it.

I fell in love with the SOUND of the debut LP the moment I heard it, but ended up liking only a couple actual songs. Same is true for Aeroplane, though the songs are better and the overall sound less appealing. At this point, they seem like an okay thing that I don't ever need to hear again. Have to admit that the things like the quote above do drive me a little crazy ("I came to understand with the thousands of other people who have been changed by this music...").

4) "Two-Headed Boy" is a great great great indie rock song, just a great song period; I think if Jeff believed that discipline were a virtue, which he doesn't, he'd be routinely writing some of the great songs of the age.

-- J0hn D.

This I agree with, though I suspect I still wouldn't be a big fan.

Kinda moot given the dropping out forevermore bit.

Like a movie like The Holy Mountain, or Anne Carson's poetry, or any other work so personal and flawless one can only ever really look in on it and wonder, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea has the rare distinction of existing only technically inside commerce, criticism and opinion. You can of course have an opinion about it, but it would be really hard to even approach the intentions that made it, let alone the constantly unraveling impact it has had and continues to have a decade later. I came to understand with the thousands of other people who have been changed by this music, that you could argue to finer points, but the core of what the record meant was perfect, pure and silently understood.

-- St3ve Go1db3rg, Tuesday, February 12, 2008 5:49 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Link

^^^ YEESH

I know, right? It's just a fucking album. Some people like it.

yeah that is some corny shit.

"oh by the way, this album is a perfect and immovable object and completely above all criticism, though you can have an opinion if you like."

bad fans /= bad album

im not saying that, even though this guy's voice does make me want to jump out the window.

yeah i'm not talking about the album, either

In The Aeroplane Over The Sea is like the Ron Paul of albums.

i like this album!! he's a really good melodist. i haven't listened to it in a long time.

that quote is o_O in extremis

i like both albums a lot

I should mention when I was 15, this album made prone to gushing fanaticism a la above quote, and I suppose I am one of those 'thousands of other people whose lives have been changed by it."

I don't know whether I matured out of it, or if the music actually stopped being as good. I suspect the former, with a hint of the latter. I think it's still very good, but I can survive going a year or more at a time without giving too much though to it.

It makes sense that people who don't like or don't get Aeroplane would also not like or not get the reactions people have to it. But what can you do.

do get over yourself goldberg

Maybe you should get over me.

Hard to get over what never happened.

I never happened? I don't follow. My point was that we were talking about NMH, not about me.

i was reacting to your prissy statement upthread. "oh what's to be done about those people who don't get it??"

but anyway, the moment has passed

RIP, heaven needed, etc.

I said "don't like or don't get." Some people don't get it because it's not the most accessible album, while I allow that other people may get it and still not enjoy it.

But with an album so weird and unfiltered and rapturous, there's a certain barrier to entry. You have to embrace all of that "embarrassing" stuff. If you're not on board with that, it makes sense that you'd see the weird, unfiltered, rapturous reactions to the album in the same cynical way.

Argue with my premise if you want, there's no need to make it personal.

i love this album, but i think it could definitely stand to be a bit less embarrassing.

I get this album.

I like the song about the girl in spain or whatever and a few others, don't think its hard to get, dont think its be all end all, at the time thought it was a better elephant six album and was surprised when all the emo girls put it on in photography class. I guess if I thought melody driven poppy songs with punk/indie recording quality was the best kind of music out there Id think this album was the best ever too

Fuckin fuck. I get the album. I like the album. It's EXTREMELY accessible. I just draw the line at liking it.

never got the love. but on avery island is pretty great. i still remember the first time i heard it, and it reminded me a lot of the madcap laughs, in spirit, if not necessarily sonically. and then all sorts of people seemed to find the second one the greatest thing ever and i'd ask what they thought of the first one and most would say they'd never heard it. i always thought that was pretty weird. such is life

Why the fuck do people like this shit. They sound like Cake.

On Avery Island is great

I embrace embarrassing stuff in music all the time, but this isn't embarrassing, it's just grating to my ears. Nails on a chalkboard. Makes me physically ill.

I'm siding with Steve here. Do we always have to look at everything through a lens of cool, critical detachment? Of course everyone's absolutely entitled to say "I prefer their first album" or "there are two or three good songs on Aeroplane, but that's it" - but you then surely need to accept that for a small percentage of the population, this record has an extraordinary, emotional power. Half the time I have no idea what Mangum is really singing about, but when this record catches me at the right time it has the power to reduce me to a quivering wreck and my response to it is one of pure and magical love. Is that "embarrassing"? Not to me.

ya i accept it. what do you want me to do about it, never think about this album critically because some people really like it a lot? that's true of a lot of albums! i'm sure people love lionel richie albums as much as you love neutral milk hotel!

I'm sure they do, too! I'd just humbly suggest that if "this guy's voice makes (you) want to jump out the window", you might perhaps not want to waste your time thinking about the album critically - in the same way that I don't want to waste my time thinking about the album critically because it fills me with a sense of wonder and purity.

It sounds like campfire songs with Jeff's see-saw voice. I can't get over how much I hate his voice and the vocal rhythm. However, his voice sounds like all the popular indie singers of today and even the nu-rock nasal screaming I hate.

sounds like all the popular indie singers of today
Really?

I love this album to pieces, if anyone doesn't, that's fine. I remember trying to write more about them when it came out, and they came over, and the response from the Melody Maker was that they sounded like the panpipe band in The Fast Show. I sort of understand peoples' ire against those who don't 'get' it, as a result, but it doesn't bother me much. one of the things I love about the record is that its unafraid to be 'embarassing'.

I still love In the Aeroplane Over the Sea, but I never thought it was perfect.

I think the opening track, "The King of Carrot Flowers Pt. One," is perfect. The stretch of songs from 6-9, "Holland, 1945," "Communist Daughter," "Oh Comely," and "Ghost" is also pretty awesome.

so good

good yes, overrated also yes

hearing neutral milk hotel at ear-splitting volume was what made me decide never to go back to Soda (the bar) on indie rock night, no matter how good the burger is.

http://images.emusic.com/music/images/album/284/114/070/11407007/600x600.jpg

fyi

^^i saw this the other day. i don't know what to make of it, but i laughed

the sunn o))) thing totally makes it imo

well that and the fact it is pure lol

hahahahaha

okay wow 1:12-1:14 in that video

Jeff Mangum was on Jeopardy the other day, I wonder if this means there's going to be an NMH reunion.

http://9001chan.org/mus/220/Courage-Wolf-hate-her-when-she-gets-up-to-leave-then-devour-her-with-your-two-heads.jpg

so Jeff Mangum is playing at the September ATP / Portishead I'll Be Your Mirror event in Asbury Park. This'll be his first 'official' performance in over a decade, right?