Ah the classic album, the once proud and great tradition of going into your local record shop and buying a big flat vinyl offering of an hour of quality music. Unfortunately the album, like vinyl records themselves, are a dying breed, whilst downloading is instant and don’t take up any space (apart from on your hard drive) and the once great art of the classic album is withering away in the sand dunes of time.
Think to yourself of some of the greatest albums you have ever heard and the same names keep coming up. The Beatles? Oasis? Nirvana? Limp Bizkit and The Chocolate Starfish In Hot Dog Flavoured Water? Well okay maybe not the last one, but there is one band by one album that is sorely missed off anyone’s list. And you have probably never heard of them.
Neutral Milk Hotel’s second album ‘In The Aeroplane Over The Sea’ can be summed up in one word, masterpiece. It’s up there with the all time greats of modern music, a story of one man’s obsession with the tragic Anne Frank, the little Jewish girl who hid for her life while all the horror of the Second World War unfolded around her.
NMH’s main man, Jeff Mangum, is a genius. His songs are filled to the brim with melancholy and inspiring lyrics, some which are slightly cryptic and require delving into, while others portray raw emotion as naked as the day we are born.
It was clear that after the 1996 debut album ‘On Avery Island’, that NMH were destined for great things, even if they never received the commercial success they truly deserved. Record Conpany Elephant 6 gave NMH, and master of ceremonies and Mangum in particular a free rein and both he and his band took full advantage. Just listen closely to what you are hearing when you put the record on. Mangum, like his peers Elliott Smith and Jeff Buckley, wears his heart on his sleeve but keeps his hands in his pockets, allowing you in but imploring you to look closer at the bigger picture and not to get too close.
The album opens with King Of Carrot Flowers Pt 1, a simple yet very satisfying opener which tells the short story of an unhappy family of which the parents will do anything to escape, while their teenage child experiences sexual contact for the very first time. The lyrics ‘as we would lay and learn what each others bodies were for’ and ‘from above you I sank into your soul, into that secret place where no one dares to go’ depicts the tentative exploration of a couples first time and also acts as a metaphor to a persons inner psyche and opening up in more ways than one. For a song that just scrapes the two-minute mark, ‘Carrot Flowers Pt 1’ delves very deep indeed.
After parts two and three of the first song drown out, the title song is definately one of the highlights. This is where tribute to Ms Frank is really laid bare and Mangum encourages the listener to live in the moment because there are things in life that can end it so suddenly. ‘And one day we will die and our ashes will fly from the aeroplane over the sea, but for now we are young let us lay in the sun and count every beautiful thing we can see, love to be, in the arms of all I’m keeping here with me’.
Another notable highpoint of the album comes after the brass interlude in the form of ‘Holland 1945’. Never has such a linear story been told so fast yet so complete, with the starkness of war imagery and life after death and playing piano’s filled with flames explaining Mangum’s passion through music for such a destructive time.
The epic ‘Oh Comely’ is a battle, a duel between the simple acoustic strumming and the strong, rough vocal chords of Mangum and the graphic, almost uncomfortable lyrics depicting a cheating father and a yearn to have saved Anne Frank ‘in some sort of time machine’.
Aeroplane’s finale ‘Two Headed Boy Pt 2’ is an exceptional piece of music and this is where Mangum, who sounds as if he is wrestling with his emotions throughout the track, lays the agony of love and loss bare. The lyric ‘God is a place where some holy spectacle lies’ is better than anything Lennon and McCartney ever wrote and its such a shame that this was NMH’ last album because Mangum would now be known as well as they are. But maybe that was the point, his star shone brightly for a short space of time and this makes him more special than some of those we as music fans have grown tired of over the years.
What happened next is as much a disappointment as it is important to ‘Aeroplane’s cult status. Mangum, burnt out and tired of the music business, turned his back on the big time just as it looked as if he had made it, by turning down an offer from REM to support them on tour and soon after NMH disbanded, with Mangum making a final solo appearance in early 1999. It would be nearly ten years until he would perform any NMH material live again, at the Elephant 6 birthday tour in 2008.
Sometimes songs like those on ‘Aeroplane’ are designed to be music for the brave. It is an emotional roller coaster of poignant love songs written to an icon of a time gone by, when the world was breaking all around her and finding beauty is the worst of situations. It is easy listening to some, but to others can be exhausting to listen to and not the ideal choice for those who prefer the more commercial offerings spin-doctors like Simon Cowell peddle onto our airwaves day after day which is a shame as soon I am sure most people will look like a reject from a bad Skins audition, wearing pink tank tops borrowed from your sister and going to Lady Gaga concerts.
If you have never listened to Neutral Milk Hotel’s masterpiece I encourage you to do so. You won’t regret it.
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