Oh comely (Neutral Milk Hotel) (LP 3350 - 3351)

Neutral Milk Hotel  On Avery Island (CD, Merge Records, 1996) *** 

Neutral Milk Hotel  In The Aeroplane Over The Sea (CD, Merge Records, 1998) ***** 

Genre: Alt-rock

Places I remember: Fopp, HMV

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Two-Headed Boy (Aeroplane)

Gear costume: Holland 1945 (Aeroplane)

They loom large in his legend (The Album Collection playlists): Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5

Active compensatory factors: Neutral Milk Hotel is the brainchild of Jeff Mangum, and more of a solo project on the first album On Avery Island. While it's lo-fi and quite experimental there are hints of the glory to come with the second album (the one I bought first incidentally).

On Avery Island is mainly a collaboration between Mangum and friend/producer Robert Schneider. Critic Jason Ankeny sums up proceedings well - Throughout the record, Jeff Mangum's wheels threaten to fly off at any time -- his songs are cryptic and crazed, his ideas fast and furious, and together they force the home-recording concept out of the basement and into a brave new world.

In The Aeroplane Over The Sea is Neutral Milk Hotel's second, and final, album. It's an inspired collection that just grows in stature with each playing. Jeff's delivery is more confident, and the sound is lusher than the first album.

A Pitchfork critic sums up my feelings towards this album well - It's an album people want to keep for themselves—sharing it with only those closest to them. The way it has become a quintessential cult album—widely loved as well as widely unknown—makes it easy to believe there's something special between you and it—that it's yours alone no matter how many people love it.

Where do they all belong? A unique bit of alt-rock.