Yeah you can point press the first stage a bit. Also hit the silver one as late as possible, to maximise points from when it clears the screen. Add a few blocks above it too for more points
In 106 theres 3 fire buttons you can map, for super fast firing. I can't control it as well so I just use 175 with 1 fire button.
Stage 3 onwards you need to group the blocks together to give yourself more time to shoot the rest, it gets too fast to do singles everywhere. - I haven't learnt this properly.
I've only just started playing it too. Will throw in some more tips when I learn a bit more