at a glance...

Hometown: Denver, CO
Formed: circa 1993

Members:
Eric Allen -bass guitar, backing vocals
John Hill -electric and acoustic guitars, backing vocals
Chris McDuffie -synthesizers, piano, organ, backing vocals, mellotron, percussion
Robert Schneider -electric and acoustic guitars, piano, organ, mellotron, synthesizers, lead and backing vocals
Hilarie Sidney -drums, percussion, lead and backing vocals, electric guitar

Bands in the family :
Olivia Tremor Control, Neutral Milk Hotel, Flydaddys, Beulah, Dressy Bessy, Of Montreal, The Minders, The Frosted Ambassador, Music Tapes, Bablic

Notes:
Apples In Stereo released a few split 7-inches, including one with fellow 60s-psychedelicists Olivia Tremor Control, on various indie labels before recording their debut album, Fun Trick Noisemaker on spinART in 1995. Quickly won the patronage of some of the big names of American indie rock, touring with Flaming Lips, Beck and Pavement, before releasing Tone Soul Evolution in February of 1998. Discovery Of A World Inside The Moone is their latest release.

Once in a while, a record will come out that will makes you feel better about how much money you've spent on music throughout the years. Once in a while, an album will appear that makes you want to throw away every other album in your record collection, and only listen to that one. Once in a while, a record will come out that's simply perfect: the perfect driving music, the perfect music to make love to, the perfect music to do spring cleaning to. Once in a while, a record will come out that's foot-tapping, hair-tossing, head-flapping wonderful. Once in a while, a record will come out that will makes you want to be a rock star more than ever. Once in a while, a record will come out that compels you to sing along with your hairbrush microphone, bouncing around in front of a mirror. Once in a while, an album will make its way to you, screaming, "Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner!" And right now, that record is the Apples In Stereo's latest, The Discovery Of A World Inside The Moone.

Robert Schneider and his band of musical merrymakers have done it once more: they've managed to capture pure sunshine and ocean sprays on a CD. The Discovery Of A World Inside The Moone is their finest record to date - pure, gleeful pop virtuosity. Each of the 12 gems on this album is a fully realized pop vision of rainbows, submarines, and summer afternoons. The first moments of the album's explosive opener, "Go," burst out of the speakers like soap bubbles. Sure, they've done things before in the same vein: 1998's Tone Soul Evolution was also a graduate thesis in British-Invasion pop, and last year's Her Wallpaper Reverie interspersed pop gems with hissing and psychedelic Batman sounds (WHOMP! SPLAT!), but Discovery... acts as an amplification of the Apples' fanciful universe, a magical mystery tour in technicolor pink.

Schneider and Hilarie Sidney (finally used as more than the token female in the band) have poured gallons of confectioner's sugar into these impeccable songs. Where they can go from here is unclear, but one thing is: get your copy, right away. An album like this only comes along once in a while.

If you like The Apples In Stereo, check out:
Apples In Stereo Tone Soul Evolution
Olivia Tremor Control
Neutral Milk Hotel In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
The Boo Radleys Wake Up!
The Beatles Rubber Soul

-- Susannah Grossman