a sort of stupid thing i've been thinking

[staralfur]

sometimes when you listen to neutral milk hotel, do you ever feel like you're simply bursting at your seams to show this music to the whole world? like maybe whole countries could find peace and people fall in love and stray puppies be given homes and everything made right to ITAOTS. i get so frustrated because it's like there's this beautiful white light streaming from my bedroom and i just want the whole world to know how happy and peaceful and complete this single piece of music from this obscure little band can make them, if they only tried, or cared.
and then sometimes it seems that no one deserves to be that happy anyway, and that the whole world really is crass and cheap and mean in a hundred little ways and even if they tried to understand music like that, they just couldn't.
i don't know. it's like sometimes i'm so heartened by this album, this BAND that i feel like i'm going to burst with joy and hope, and sometimes i just want the whole world to fall down an open manhole and die for not giving themselves the chance to feel that way.

[Freakboy]

I FEEL THE EXACT SAME WAY!!
I played "She did a lot of acid" for this girl the other day she was like "omg thats the best song EVER" and im like "Damn strait!" and shes all "who are these guys!?" and im like "The best band EVER neutral milk hotel!" so yah.

[Mirsathia]

God, I know exactly what you mean! I just can't comprehend why people go "Eww, what is this?!" when they hear me playing it!

Listening to Aeroplane makes me want to spread wings and fly. It makes me so absolutely happy... like some void in my soul is filled. :D

[Freakboy]

thats because people who listen to britney spears and linkin park cant understand the goodness which is Neutral Milk Hotel. And very few other people are screwed up SO MUCH that they'd appreciate the stuff Jeff comes up with ^_^

[channelfan]

this is a difficult subject. in a lot of cases mainstream=manufactured, at least to some degree. of course the most utterly depressing example of this is 'american idiot, er idol'. millions upon millions buy into this, and it is very sad. we know that mainstream radio is controlled by the big ones, who pay the radio stations to play a set of songs and only those songs, over and over again. now, we see all this for exactly what it is, but i have to say that for those that are into it, truly into it, then that's fine with me, people have different tastes and closed minds. unfortunately, most mainstream listeners are merely sheep following the crowd. much like many other not so pleasant things in our country, mainstream music is pushed so hard into peoples faces that, bombarded with repeated spins, huge promotional campaigns, and such, they get caught up in it. but still, even though most are simply following the herd, i try not to think any less of them, it's their ears and as long as i can step as far away as possible from linkin park, shania twain, celiene dion and the stations that play them, i'm fine.

[friend]

i guess i don't come across people that listen to linkin park etc. too often. through my eyes it seems like more people listen to neutral milk than that kind of music. of course i know this is not true. "screwed up" is a way i would think of someone that gets nmh. you probably meant screwed up in the sense that someone who agrees with society's "rules" would think such music and it's fans must be screwed up.
if someone really likes any song, it would make me happy.
rock on,
brian ;)

[Mirsathia]

Hmm..

Yes, it is an interesting topic. In all honesty, I've got a crapload of mainstream music on my hard drive. My first introduction to this stuff was when my consort sent me Oh Comely, oh, a bit more than a year ago now. And it was.. much different than what I was used to--I had, still do, have a taste for popular alternative/rock music--but I gave it a chance, and it absolutely sucked me in.

And.. Finding more and more independant music, it all somehow seems to have more soul than any of the popular junk that's out there these days. I love it more and more.

Unfortunately (oddly, it seems to me almost), the art college that I attend to.. noone else listens to indie music. When I put on my CD in class everyone stares at me oddly and tells me to change the CD. It's really disappointing that noone know about this stuff, and aren't open-minded enough to be willing to give it a chance. :(

Um.. I can't quite remember the point of my post, but hopefully it makes a little bit of sense. Just one of my mini-rants, heh.

[dolemites_sister]

I used to work at a record store (one of the big chain ones) and the distributor from WEA (who unusually was also a big indie fan) said that when something comes out they want to make money on they play it on the radio over and over and over, and then they make the CD really cheap for a week or two,and then gradually raise the price. This was also in the days before napster.

And if you notice, 9 out of 10 of those artists upset about napster have one "decent" (I use this term loosely) song on their CD and they want people to spend the money on their crappy CD because if people listen before they buy they will realize that their CD sucks and just download the one song.

I was a chemistry major in college, and NO ONE listened to indie when I started.. By the time I was done however, I had converted a few.

But like channelfan said, if people want to subject their ears to crap, that's fine, as long as I don't have to listen to it.

j

[JuneSalutesYou]

http://www.beefheart.com/filtered/quote.jpg

[friend]

i like that quote very much

[William]

I agree. I try to spread Neutral Milk Hotel to anybody willing to listen. 6 out of 10 people like it. The other 4 don't give it enough time. Neutral Milk Hotel will always be my favorite band. If only more people would listen the state of music, and the world would be a much better place.

[Lizardboy]

One of the "problems" with NMH is that they're so consistently good, and you have to listen to everything to appreciate that.
Both albums read like a story and the outstanding this is that unlike other good bands who tend to have a few fantastic songs and lots of very good songs, NMH have an entirity of fantastic songs. Ask 50 NMH fans what their favourite NMH song is and you'll probably get 20 different answers. For a band who only released 2 albums that's unheard of. How can a "new fan" appreciate that?

Te other question that this discussion raises is about how we ourselves got into the band. Personally, I downloaded a couple of MP3s fairly randomly (I've only really listened to lots of music for the last 4 or 5 years, and had heard NMH mentioned in a good light a couple of times, so I checked them out) on a bored afternoon- Holland 1945 and Two headed Boy pt 1. Liked them so much I got a few more and soon after went and bought both albums and have never stopped listening since!

[channelfan]

i first heard and bought ais 'tone soul' and subsequently began to search out information on this e6 deal and the other bands. aots came out and i bought it. never have i been so astounded then the first time i listened to it. i was literally rolling on the floor with glee at this wonderful piece of work. i called freinds explaining what a wonderful band i had found and let them listen over the phone. of course they didn't get it that way but once they really heard it some times they came around.
i rushed out to get avery island and of course found the same exquisite quality, and suddenly i had 2 amazing records to fully immerse myself in. at the time i was working at a place where i could listen to my cdplayer while i worked. the sounds coming through my headphones just continued to astound me. every day i would listen to each album multiple times.
the next time a record smacked me silly was olivia's dusk...but thats a whole other story!

[aftm]

i hadn't heard of nmh until they were gone, and when i had managed to hunt down Aeroplane and Avery and Jittery Joes and all thos little bootlegs, and i had listened and listened, i was so heartbroken that there was no more. and when that hoax came out about jeff coming back this year i was so happy, if only for a moment before discovering the fake. i am so hoping jeff records some songs that i can get hold of, it's so hard when i live in a small town in new zealand with pretty much no access to anything other than the regular mainstream crap. avery and aeroplane are pretty much all i listen to these days...

[Stormx]

I don't think you can really understand Neutral Milk Hotel the first time you listen to it. Especially if you've had no introduction to the sort of music it is... It is truely wonderful though, but around here, music for a lot of people isn't really important as music.... the pimps just use it at parties to get laid, the the kind of offense against that is made up of people who listen to emo/metal. All the indie is so mainstream it makes me sick, though some bands that could be considered mainstream I do like...


I think the main reasons I like NMH are:

- Its very different from everything else, the verse-verse-chorus-verse-chorus doesn't exist in NMH
- The use of instruments is incredible, I love the instrumental tracks
- The lyrics are always mysteries to everyone and are so tricky to work out
- Its just incredibly well written/played. Absolutely amazing!

And yes I do feel like I want to share it to the world and I try to... my friend is really into NMH now!

[YK]

taste is a subjective thing. There's no reason not to understand why somebody wouldn't like nmh. I don't like rap music, yet i can appreciate it. I don't like Beethoven, yet some friend of mine is completely going ballistic about him. Should one be suprised/annoyed/whatever because he/she is listening to this "mainstream crap", and will never appreciate the splendour that is nmh? Of course not. Nobody enjoys music in the same way.

[guy]

The music NMH wrote down on paper comes from the same source that produced the Bible, ladies and gents. It speaks to the deeper parts of us all and for those willing to listen closely enough, leaves us better than we were before we heard it and forever changed. The treasures we are all capable of producing musically and in other ways are locked up within us. I believe Jeff's relationships were the keys to his creative process. We, too, have something wonderful and original and even inspirational things to sing about. We will never realize them if we don't develop relationships with people who will force us to look at ourselves beyond our facades. Sermon's over. :)

[ж]

Originally posted by aftm
i hadn't heard of nmh until they were gone, and when i had managed to hunt down Aeroplane and Avery and Jittery Joes and all thos little bootlegs, and i had listened and listened, i was so heartbroken that there was no more. and when that hoax came out about jeff coming back this year i was so happy, if only for a moment before discovering the fake. i am so hoping jeff records some songs that i can get hold of, it's so hard when i live in a small town in new zealand with pretty much no access to anything other than the regular mainstream crap. avery and aeroplane are pretty much all i listen to these days...

you live in new zealand, dude! rampage yr local record store AT ONCE. look for anything with flying nun or xpressway written on the label. way better than nmh.

[Big-H]

There are so many people who pick up different things in music.

Honestly, I mostly pay attention to lyrics and meaning, etc. So many of my friends just listen for 'beat' and yes, in turn they listen to rap/mainstream music.

However, I'm not gonna change them, cause I can't. I've played NMH for my ex, who is into rap, and she doesn't like the Jeff's voice. Plain and simple (and she probably doesn't think much of the various instruments as well). But other times I explain to people I'm into that 'noisey-psychedellic music' and they're like "eww". So what can ya do?

[Stormx]

Lyrics have never been a hugely important thing for me... What the words say isn't as important as like... they way they're sung/spoken... and equally the instruments/how the are used.

[sellout250]

I agree with Storm. There are quite a few songs sung with such <i>paaaaaaasion</i> and you can't help but agree with them, even if it's about killing people. Like "Soup" by Blind Melon. But as for bursting at the seems, I get that feeling during the climax of "Ghost" and during "two-headed boy pt 2".

[emanresu]

I feel this way about Pavement and OTC

Would anyone mind sending me "She Did A Lot of Acid"?

[Gokk]

http://www.toaster.org/cards/toast.jpg

[Edited on 12-17-0606 by Gokk]

[emanresu]

i shoulda known

[birdman]

say, hypothetically, that within the next 100 years Neutral Milk, like the bible, were to become the holliest reference point that one could fall upon. It becoming the subject of countless am stations, sunday morning tv, and endless youth groups, would the world be a better or worse place? With the sense of normalcy it attains, because it would be impossible for it to reach this point without it being centralized to the masses of the human population, would latter youths, like mangum respond against neutral milk as if it were the dredges of culture?

[guy]

The issue is creativity in art and our response to it, not the Bible, not NMH. Billy Joe's Jesus of Suburbia is indeed a lie.

[Cecil]

I think that once you get into Neutral Milk Hotel, you won't stop showing it to people. I can't bring myself to keep something like that a secret.

[birdman]

Originally posted by guy
The music NMH wrote down on paper comes from the same source that produced the Bible, ladies and gents. It speaks to the deeper parts of us all and for those willing to listen closely enough, leaves us better than we were before we heard it and forever changed. The treasures we are all capable of producing musically and in other ways are locked up within us. I believe Jeff's relationships were the keys to his creative process. We, too, have something wonderful and original and even inspirational things to sing about. We will never realize them if we don't develop relationships with people who will force us to look at ourselves beyond our facades. Sermon's over. :)

I apologize, I was just intriqued by your sermon and wished to add to it. I was attempting to concentrate on your points of relationships as the key to creative process and attempting to get beyond the facades that exist within our life. I guess i went down a blind alley. Guy, would you mind explaining Billy Joel's Jesus of suburbia. Thanks. Sorry.
Birdman.

[guy]

I was referring to the Jesus on the Greenday- American Idiot album. No apologies necessary. Although, I must say, I'm not surprised to see civil discourse by E6er's. Danka!

[sammantha]

above all, i think "mainstream" should only hold the connotation of being well known and popular. at times i feel like people who listen to independent/underground artists like to pen it as being bad. mainstream and underground should only be measures of popularity. it's the content of the music that should say whether something is good or not.. i just want to say that.

i guess you could assume that many wouldn't enjoy neutral milk hotel if they listened. i don't think you can call them ignorant or unwilling to really listen to the material. music is a matter of preference. some people have low expectations when it comes to music: a phat beat and nice voice, baby. others, i think, take into consideration everything about it.

[Stormx]

Whether something is popular is not a reflection of whether it is good or bad, because the latter is a matter of opinion. Popular/mainstream is a reflection that a lot of people think it is good. The way I see it, "underground bands" like nmh and such didn't acheive mainstream sucess because it is very unique, and you need to be a certain sort of person to like it. A bit like marmite ^_^. Usually people will listen to mainstream music and find it pretty good... not something they'd absolutely fall in love with, because if it pleases everyone it has to be fairly... well, produced and public-ready. Underground music misses out this step, so there could be a little more creativity.

An example is coldplay. Back with parachutes, they were a pretty individual band. But in the following albums, the producers turned down the bass and guitar and turned up the vocals, because thats what the public wants. They see coldplay as an indie / soft rock band. When the arctic monkeys burst onto the scene here in the UK, a little of their popularity was gained by the fact they were sold as a rock band, so the public WANTED guitar and bass.

What i'm saying, is the more people like your band, the more popular it becomes. And if you say that the public was made up of 50% hip-hop lovers and 50% death metal lovers, the band would be somewhere in between, and as such, wouldn't be strongly unique in either direction, as it is trying to please the entire audience.

And when I say band I usually mean the production... Usually bands go downhill from their original fans because they've been snapped up by people who change the way their music sounds (e.g. the manics, nirvana)

[eggcup]

authentic creation vs. corporate markets. …the world sells us insecurity, to encourage us in a life time of relentless self improvement and the masking our authentic selves with images we can buy - cooler clothes, bigger stars, being in style with hip- hop images, indie images and the like. Authentic selves are not profitable to the world. But none of that compels or interests the spirit. Do you believe that nmh was created in the spirit, or for the world?

[Stormx]

I think this whole topic is getting to philosophy!

I think... the way e6 works... theres a shift in motivation from "making it". For instance, the band I'm "in" with (I do their mixing/recording) has a wonderful songwriter/guitarist/pianist. He's very focused on getting an EP recorded, get gigging, etc. Its a healthy way to work, and he's basicly doing it so they can have some sort of local fame like some other bands around here have.

Rest of the band is pretty relaxed... our rehearsels are deteriorating a little just cause the second guitarist/bassist are so lax. I do, however, think that the lead singer/songwriter's attitude to it works similarly to those of the bigger bands... especially the "commericalised" ones... They write music for personal gain...

I think e6 works in a pretty relaxed way. I mean, from what I know, they record in eachothers bedrooms on tape recorders... and everyone seems to be a member / follower of eachothers bands. Thats also a healthy sort of way of doing it... the sense of community in underground music. Everyone supporting everyone else, where as commercial music is moneys/major labels supporting the band. I think the relaxed attitude gives the writers time to think... you can't paint an original masterpiece without trying every composition and so forth.... It sings creativity and diversity, whether the music is electronica or folk rock or whatever....

I think this can be shown with pretty much everything we do to identify with ourselves, as eggcup said!

Be it clothing, music, attitudes to friends, frequency at myspace.com (lol), etc. I think there is a center point at which a lot of commercial music hovers around... kind of a circle with genres like dance rock or indie or whatever on each side. And the further you get to the edge of the circle, the more underground and original the music, yet the lower the publicity or listeners.


And I think that is entirely understandable! I have an album of noise called "Bad Karma" by illusion of safety. I don't like it much, but I know someone who loves that shit. Put it on the radio, and you'll get bad ratings, because it simply doesn't please the general public! Even stations like XFM have to play songs which have "made it" somewhat, otherwise they'd fail.

[clouds-chan]

I think one of the most important aspect of e6 i not taking yourself so darn seriously.

[Stormx]

XD totally agree...

[atrocities]

I think a lot of debates are pointless, as they aren't realy debates where there's going to be a winner, they're just a statement of opinion. which you couldn't ever explain as well as you understand it in your own mind.

[glovguy]

I think me and everyone else on this message board shouldn't really debate this. My opinion on the matter is quite skewed. I know everyone else here will feel exactly the same on this issue. It's pointless saying to each other, "oh, yeah, I feel exactly the same way" and "cool, It's not just me."

but hey, if you want to...

[clouds-chan]

but hey, it's nice.