If you asked a devoted Rate Your Music user or a member of a niche music Facebook group or Subreddit for album recommendations, it’s highly likely that their, albeit lengthy, list would include a little record from 1998 titled In the Aeroplane Over the Sea. Recorded in the now-demolished Pet Sounds Studio in Denver, it was the second album from lo-fi indie rockers Neutral Milk Hotel, and it was also their last. 

Neutral Milk Hotel were born out of 1980s Louisiana. Beginning as Jeff Magnum’s solo project, his songs were put onto homemade cassettes as part of the fake record label turned real collective, Elephant 6. By 1996, Magnum released his debut studio record, On Avery Island, to a positive but fairly limited reception. 

Following the release of his debut, Magnum collected new bandmates in Julian Koster, Scott Spillane, Jeremy Barnes, and his long-time friend and producer Robert Schneider. The Neutral Milk Hotel had checked in four new guests, all ready to fill out Magnum’s sound and songwriting with accordion, horns, and even a bowed banjo. 

After moving to New York City and honing their collective sound on tour, the newly full band were ready to make their studio return in 1998 with In the Aeroplane Over the Sea. Retaining that lo-fi indie sound while incorporating the series of unusual instruments they had learned to play, Neutral Milk Hotel delivered a sleeper indie classic. 

The critical reception to the album at the time of its release was fairly underwhelming. While many shared their enjoyment for the record, few anticipated the legendary status it would acquire in the coming years. Neutral Milk Hotel embarked upon a tour to promote the record, which would take them across North America and Europe. Far from the lo-fi sound of their music, their live presence was characterised by chaos and violence, perhaps a contributing factor to Magnum’s eventual recoiling from the project. 

An uptick in interest led the band’s frontman to waver on his choice to pursue the project. As the frontman increasingly struggled with his mental health and the demands of fame, they quietly broke up after completing their live dates, leaving fans to wonder what happened to a project that had delivered such promise. 

It seems like the kind of musical story that would fade with time. Countless bands have put out two albums and then disappeared into near obscurity, but not Neutral Milk Hotel. Rather, they have only become more iconic with time. In 2005, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea was reissued, and since then, interest in the record has only grown. 

While Neutral Milk Hotel went on hiatus, online audiences discovered and lauded the album. It now sits in 31st place on Rate Your Music’s top albums of all time, ranking above essential indie records like The Smiths’ The Queen Is Dead and Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures. It’s now a defining indie staple.

Aside from a series of solo tours in the early 2010s and reunion tours in the mid-2010s, Neutral Milk Hotel remained fairly inactive. The Aeroplane Over the Sea remains their final record, but what a way to go out. The odd life of Neutral Milk Hotel is one wholly indicative of the current age of music – their legacy persisted past a 1990s cult following onto online message boards and social platforms, and they became elusive indie icons.