"Missing" Pitchfork review

May 23, 2006 11:50 AM

Where can I get a copy of Pitchfork Media's original review of "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea" by Neutral Milk Hotel?

When the album was reissued in the UK, Pitchfork took the opportunity to rewrite their review, giving it their top score of 10.0. The original review was somewhere in the 7-9 range, I believe. This original page is also newly missing from the Wayback Machine (see here where there is now a broken Wayback link, although many other of their pages remain in the archive).

Did anyone print it out? Did anyone copy and paste it into their blog? Does anyone have any ideas for finding it? Is this just one of the interesting/sad effects of digital media?

posted by unknowncommand to media & arts (21 comments total)

You mean this one?
posted by deadfather at 11:56 AM on May 23, 2006

Easier to read version.

FYI, rating is 8.7.
posted by deadfather at 11:58 AM on May 23, 2006

Thw wayback page seems to be up and down. Here is the text




Neutral Milk Hotel
In The Aeroplane Over The Sea
[Merge]
Rating: 8.7

As good indie pop acts grow fewer and further between, the
driving force of the underground is growing decidedly noisy and abstract. But while fab acts like Gastr Del Sol, Flying Saucer Attack and Tortoise continue to pulverize traditional song structure, there's one psych- rock band making music that's just as catchy as it is frightening.

From the opening "King of Carrot Flowers," In The Aeroplane Over The Sea shifts from acoustic folkiness to loud, fast punk rock with little or no warning. It features a noisy horn section and a dreamy singin' saw, all rolled into a package that does a credible job of blending Sgt. Pepper with early '90s lo-fi.

Neutral Milk Hotel frontman Jeff Magnum writes songs that read like bad dreams. He inherits a world of cannibalism, elastic sexuality and freaks of nature. We can only assume he
likes it there.

-M. Christian McDermott
Sound Clip:
"Ghost" MPEG-LayerII 64kpbs.44kHz. 295k.37sec.
posted by jessamyn at 12:00 PM on May 23, 2006

I have tried that wayback page infinity times from 3 different computers! Thanks for the text!
posted by unknowncommand at 12:10 PM on May 23, 2006

I didn't know they'd screwed up the review so badly. Giving one of the best albums of all time an 8.7 and spelling the artist's name wrong. I never gave Pitchfork much mind, but this is even more reason to ignore it.
posted by Hildago at 12:22 PM on May 23, 2006

Ah, and now I completely understand the wayback machine URL's. Thanks again folks.
posted by unknowncommand at 12:33 PM on May 23, 2006

In the writer's defense, it's a hell of an album to assimilate, and I don't think very many people realized just how important it was when it was new. I've talked with a lot of journalists about Aeroplane since my book on it came out last winter, and the consensus is that folks knew it was very good, but only in time did they realize it was extraordinary.

And the Pitchfork review is hardly a pan, is it? The attempted rewriting of critical history is more questionable than the original review.
posted by Scram at 2:10 PM on May 23, 2006

Yeah scram, I was primarily interested in the rewrite, and what becomes of digital things/history when altered. Although I have to admit that Pitchfork's most recent glowing review of Danielson's "Ships" compared to their bizarre one for "Fetch the Compass, Kids" also makes them look like bandwagoneers.
posted by unknowncommand at 2:34 PM on May 23, 2006

Scram writes "And the Pitchfork review is hardly a pan, is it? The attempted rewriting of critical history is more questionable than the original review."

It's also worth looking at their original and revised "Top 100 albums of the 90s" list, in which Aeroplane went from 80-something to 4. To their credit, they directly address the idea of a revised top 100 list in the intro to the new version, and what they say makes sense: time and distance can make artistic judgements clearer. Also to their credit, the intro to the new list provides a link to the old list.

It would have been nice if they had been that forthcoming in the case of the revised review...
posted by mr_roboto at 3:39 PM on May 23, 2006

[...] the consensus is that folks knew it was very good, but only in time did they realize it was extraordinary.

Scram: thanks for commenting, it's great to hear from someone who has such intimate knowledge of the subject (full disclosure: I bought your book for a friend's birthday).

Do you have any idea as to why this record takes such a long time with people, exactly?
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 4:48 PM on May 23, 2006

There's not necessarily a consensus among Pitchfork's reviewers. If one gives an album an 8.7, there's no reason another should be criticized years later for giving the same album a different rating years later.

It's a bit more of an issue for a best-of list, in which the writers presumably work together. But even then, it's very possibly a different set of writers, and in this case they called it out, as mentioned above.
posted by joshjs at 4:53 PM on May 23, 2006

Pitchfork was a totally different animal in 1998. It seems a little silly to judge the current incarnation by reviews like that.

It's pretty funny, though.
posted by ludwig_van at 5:57 PM on May 23, 2006

Ooh, I read your book, too, Scram. It made me very happy.

But the horn chart on the 4th page of pictures is upside down!

Do you have any idea as to why this record takes such a long time with people, exactly?

Someone once said something elsewhere on the internet, to the effect of: "I can understand how some people would not like Neutral Milk Hotel. I just don't want to hang out with those people."
posted by ludwig_van at 6:01 PM on May 23, 2006

By which I mean, I don't know why it takes such a long time with people, exactly.
posted by ludwig_van at 6:01 PM on May 23, 2006

Thank you, gnfti, for buying the book!

Do you have any idea as to why this record takes such a long time nwith people, exactly?

I reckon because it is both a very catchy, fun, oddball rock and roll record and a series of complex, powerful, disturbing and hallucinatory visions, and these two aspects work on different parts of the listener's brain and psyche. Also, dunno about you, but I can't listen to it without wanting to cry, which limits the number of times I've played it to times I felt like wanting to cry.

What do you think?

(The horn chart's upside down? Hang on a sec... Yoinks, it is! No one else has caught that. Something to fix in the next printing, thank you, ludwig_van.)
posted by Scram at 7:33 PM on May 23, 2006

FYI, the latest issue of the Columbia Journalism Review has a medium-length piece on Pitchfork.
posted by intermod at 8:40 PM on May 23, 2006

They spelled his name wrong.
posted by Hildago at 8:41 AM on May 24, 2006

Thanks, Scram.

What do you think?

I can't quite put my finger on it. What you said makes a lot of sense to me, but then again that's the kind of assessment you'd have to be already somewhat acquainted with the the record to make. It's almost as if Mangum was *willfully* indirect in presenting the album's true nature or intent, a sort of devil-may-care attitude to grabbing the (casual, at least) listener's attention, a property which to me seems very unique in our age of eroded attention spans, both on the sides of musical content providers artists and consumers music enthusiasts, even in indie/Pitchfork/whatever circles (or these days, one might argue, especially there).

Ironically, but - to fans - quite obviously, aside from the rich imagery and themes that slowly but surely trickle through after repeated listenings, it also takes a couple of spins to realize that these are also, for the most part, great pop songs. It did with me at least, and I can't quite figure out why: it might have been the production, although I had heard and liked all kinds of 'lower-fi' records before this one. Or maybe it was Jeff's voice, but then I liked his from the start. I just don't know.

All in all, I think it's safe to say that it's a magnificent record that requires some kind of investment on the part of the listener to discover-and-then-discover-again, and so it may not be for everyone. And personally, I tend to hate "growers" with a passion - I tend to listen and then like it or don't, and if I don't there's generally not much hope for the future :). In my experience, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is a dramatic exception to this rule, and has managed to conquer a very special place in my heart.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 10:11 AM on May 24, 2006

It's almost as if Mangum was *willfully* indirect in presenting the album's true nature or intent, a sort of devil-may-care attitude to grabbing the (casual, at least) listener's attention, a property which to me seems very unique in our age of eroded attention spans

Interesting. Have you ever seen him live or on video? That seems like a reasonable description of how he comes across. It's weird watching him awkwardly trying to explain what a song is about, or looking the whole time like he's shy and introverted, but somehow managing to make the songs come out sounding huge and magnificent.
posted by ludwig_van at 11:45 AM on May 24, 2006

I've seen him on web videos and heard some bootlegs, but not enough really to base an opinion on, I feel. I think the album bears a lot of this quality, as well.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 5:24 AM on May 25, 2006

i wonder if the reviewer gave it the lower rating because he was sober, then listened to it drunk and fell in love with it.

that album gets on my nerves when i am sober, but if i am sloshed, walking home from the bar, and i put it on my ipod, it just seems beautiful and profound.
posted by kneelconqueso at 12:43 PM on May 25, 2006