Apples in Stereo

Apples in Stereo
#1 Hits Explosion
(Yep Roc, 2009)

Some have already questioned the need for this product, whose title simultaneously mocks its own superfluity and celebrates the kooky K-Tel nostalgia these Elephant 6 torchbearers have always lovingly and unaffectedly made their own. And it’s true: Burn your own disc from iTunes, and this time make sure to bring “7 Stars”, “Sunndal Song”, “Stream Running Over”, “Look Away”, “Baroque”, and “She’s Telling Lies.” But what #1 Hits Explosion signifies is nice: A well-respected band of three-star reputation lobbying to be taken seriously as contenders at the end of a decade marked by heavy-hitting titles like Funeral and Hell Hath No Fury. Robert Schneider was happy to languish, churning out mathematically air-tight pop at home in between getting his weird friends off the couch to make Holocaust-era epics, seeming somewhat like a sideman in his own collective. His tunes got fluffier, bubbling up for Cartoon Network spots now and again, with innocence so unfeigned that even the cast of American Idol was permitted to take his most wide-eyed tune, “Energy”, for a joyride. And earlier this year, the cheerful, bald frontman didn’t have to jump far from his adult persona to become Robert Bobbert, his wackier children’s music project.

Although aging as gracefully as a Beatles-besotted psych-daddy can in latter-day pop or indie, Schneider is rightfully entertaining the desire to rise up with gloves on. Yep Roc isn’t the sort of label that goes around dropping cash-vacuum best-ofs; Apples in Stereo isn’t the sort of band that demands their fans pay double. What he seems to want as the ultimate prize is pop-songwriter fetishization. A greatest hits, a best-of with his name on it, a “best” period, something Apples in Stereo fans probably don’t waste many Twitter characters on before dropping another tab of acid to In the Aeroplane Over the Sea.

He wanted canonization, then he got it: Apples in Stereo is one of those rare bands whose every record is better than the one before. With the possible exception of the divide between 1997’s on-the-ball Tone Soul Evolution and 1999’s padded, Magical Mystery Tour-style souvenir Her Wallpaper Reverie, they grew undeniable by 2000’s exuberant The Discovery of a World Inside the Moone, then razor-sharp with 2002’s unjustly ignored and aptly titled Velocity of Sound, and finally taking half the decade off before bowing with 2007’s easiest listen, New Magnetic Wonder.

#1 Hits Explosion is here to make it all look easy, beginning with the band’s most well-known ditty (“Energy”) to entice the unfamiliar, sending them backwards through an almost too-tidy summary, which finally arrives at their brightest moment at track 14, “Can You Feel It?”, which consists solely of the title and the resounding reply (“It makes you feel so good!”) between oh-whoas and turn-up-your-stereos. The whole thing is impossibly innocent and stacks robot voices, guitar solos, and walls of disintegrating sugar buzz vertically to achieve Smile or Who’s Next-level engagement. Nearly spiritual. Problem is, both tunes worked better on Wonder, which offset the oncoming hyperglycemia with subdued pacers like “Play Tough.” The compilation, however, is a gorgeous testament to Schneider’s songwriting abilities, winding up the horn-pepped “Go” again (“You’re such a pretty, pretty, pretty little girl / Let’s blow this ugly, ugly, ugly little world”) with the funky “The Bird That You Can’t See” and the clapped-up Preston-Beatles roller “Ruby.” Even “Signal in the Sky”, from The Powerpuff Girls, brims with previously unnoticed twists and tricks.

But even with four Wonder tunes nailing down the worth, amateurs would be better served by any other Apples in Stereo record released in the 2000s. And are the Apples in Stereo that inaccessible to begin with? It’s great to see Schneider taking his victory lap and finally enjoying a canon of sorts, but like his heroes, the self-contained album remains his format despite whatever ability to tap out a Stephen Colbert jingle on command. And if the next real one tops New Magnetic Wonder, as per the holding pattern, he won’t need a best-of to stake his claim.

Listen: Various Tracks [at myspace.com]

Tags: Apples in Stereo, #1 Hits Explosion, Yep Roc, Elephant 6