Read Online Neutral Milk Hotel's In the Aeroplane Over the Sea by Kim Cooper - Free Book Online
Authors: Kim Cooper
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Marshmallow Coast record.
Being away from Athens didn’t curb Jeff’s sleep disorder. The close proximity to friends he didn’t always see seemed to exacerbate things. Robert Schneider got used to waking up to a full report of strange nighttime activities from his then wife Hilarie. She would describe conversations that Jeff and Robert, both sound asleep, had conducted through the walls, or nocturnal visits from a sleepwalking, confused Jeff wrapped up in his bed sheet and seeking comfort from his friends. Sometimes Jeff would be having a nightmare and Robert would talk him down, without ever waking up himself.
As with
On Avery Island
, the album began before the rest of the band arrived in Denver, with just Jeff and Robert recording together, laying down some of the simpler, acoustic songs that were actually sparser than what they’d done on the first record. Robert recalls that the opening track, “The King of Carrot Flowers Pt. One,” was one of the first things they recorded, with Jim and Robert doubling Jeff’s vocals and Robert singing harmony and playing air organ. Jeff’s guitar parts were also doubled to thicken the sound. By late summer 1997, the full consort of players was in place, bringing with them a papier-mâché human head totem that sat on the control board. They even played a couple of Neutral Milk Hotel shows in town, including an August 30 appearance with the Minders and Robert’s project the Marbles at the Across the Street Café, an appearance notable for Jeff’s leaving the payphone off the hook so Laura, still in Athens, could listen to the show.
The arrival of the Athens crew energized their friends inDenver, which was then the furthest outpost of the Elephant 6 community and a very different scene from what was happening in Georgia. Martyn Leaper recalls feeling that “these guys were onto something, and they were in a community that was very integrated and artistic and really alive. We were a lot more splintered, living in a big city of almost two million people, and honestly apart from the Apples, us and a couple of other bands, there wasn’t really a cohesiveness. When those guys showed up, they even
looked
sort of foreign. It was like a bit of a carnival or a circus, and it very much inspired us. There was a lot going on, it went on for quite a bit, and it was a lot of experimentation. They transplanted that from Athens, and it was very exciting.”
At Pet Sounds, Robert mainly recorded Neutral Milk Hotel in the band room, control room and living room. When working in the studio, he’d spread band members around the house, but keep Jeff close to the control room where they could plug his acoustic guitar straight into the four-track machine if necessary. Although Robert really hates the sound of an acoustic guitar plugged straight into the deck, Jeff was so fond of it that on the
Avery
sessions Robert had just accepted it, occasionally miking the strings to add depth to the recording. On the rare occasions that Robert tried using an electric guitar on these sessions, he immediately recognized that it just didn’t sound like Jeff Mangum music, and he wiped the tracks in favor of the acoustic take.
In the time between
Avery
and
Aeroplane
, Robert applied himself to the problem of finding a way to record Jeff’s guitar acoustically, into a mic rather than straight into the board, that both he and Jeff would be happy with. So while occasionallyJeff would resort to the line-in approach, or use it in tandem with ambient recording, on most tracks Robert captured the sound of the guitar strings through one of his treasured Neumann U 87 microphones. Robert says, “He didn’t like the way electric guitar sounded—he thought it sounded too standard, like everybody’s record. And he didn’t like the way a straight acoustic sounded, because it was too shiny and tinkly. He liked an acoustic plugged in because he kinda found it fuzzy and raw, like an electric guitar, but it had a strummy
Being away from Athens didn’t curb Jeff’s sleep disorder. The close proximity to friends he didn’t always see seemed to exacerbate things. Robert Schneider got used to waking up to a full report of strange nighttime activities from his then wife Hilarie. She would describe conversations that Jeff and Robert, both sound asleep, had conducted through the walls, or nocturnal visits from a sleepwalking, confused Jeff wrapped up in his bed sheet and seeking comfort from his friends. Sometimes Jeff would be having a nightmare and Robert would talk him down, without ever waking up himself.
As with
On Avery Island
, the album began before the rest of the band arrived in Denver, with just Jeff and Robert recording together, laying down some of the simpler, acoustic songs that were actually sparser than what they’d done on the first record. Robert recalls that the opening track, “The King of Carrot Flowers Pt. One,” was one of the first things they recorded, with Jim and Robert doubling Jeff’s vocals and Robert singing harmony and playing air organ. Jeff’s guitar parts were also doubled to thicken the sound. By late summer 1997, the full consort of players was in place, bringing with them a papier-mâché human head totem that sat on the control board. They even played a couple of Neutral Milk Hotel shows in town, including an August 30 appearance with the Minders and Robert’s project the Marbles at the Across the Street Café, an appearance notable for Jeff’s leaving the payphone off the hook so Laura, still in Athens, could listen to the show.
The arrival of the Athens crew energized their friends inDenver, which was then the furthest outpost of the Elephant 6 community and a very different scene from what was happening in Georgia. Martyn Leaper recalls feeling that “these guys were onto something, and they were in a community that was very integrated and artistic and really alive. We were a lot more splintered, living in a big city of almost two million people, and honestly apart from the Apples, us and a couple of other bands, there wasn’t really a cohesiveness. When those guys showed up, they even
looked
sort of foreign. It was like a bit of a carnival or a circus, and it very much inspired us. There was a lot going on, it went on for quite a bit, and it was a lot of experimentation. They transplanted that from Athens, and it was very exciting.”
At Pet Sounds, Robert mainly recorded Neutral Milk Hotel in the band room, control room and living room. When working in the studio, he’d spread band members around the house, but keep Jeff close to the control room where they could plug his acoustic guitar straight into the four-track machine if necessary. Although Robert really hates the sound of an acoustic guitar plugged straight into the deck, Jeff was so fond of it that on the
Avery
sessions Robert had just accepted it, occasionally miking the strings to add depth to the recording. On the rare occasions that Robert tried using an electric guitar on these sessions, he immediately recognized that it just didn’t sound like Jeff Mangum music, and he wiped the tracks in favor of the acoustic take.
In the time between
Avery
and
Aeroplane
, Robert applied himself to the problem of finding a way to record Jeff’s guitar acoustically, into a mic rather than straight into the board, that both he and Jeff would be happy with. So while occasionallyJeff would resort to the line-in approach, or use it in tandem with ambient recording, on most tracks Robert captured the sound of the guitar strings through one of his treasured Neumann U 87 microphones. Robert says, “He didn’t like the way electric guitar sounded—he thought it sounded too standard, like everybody’s record. And he didn’t like the way a straight acoustic sounded, because it was too shiny and tinkly. He liked an acoustic plugged in because he kinda found it fuzzy and raw, like an electric guitar, but it had a strummy
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