Coming Of Age: Mystery Jets

First of all, we must pose the question: Do you know Mystery Jets? Of course you do, you swiftly reply- they are the frazzled prog rockers responsible for brilliant debut album ‘Making Dens’, a strange carnival of sorts beaming their warped Syd Barrett influenced transmissions from Eel Pie island. Right?

Well, Gigwise recently caught up with lead singer Blaine Harrison and had an insightful gaze through their looking glass. What did we discover? That Britain’s most eccentric band have gone and thrown the rulebook out in search of that most elusive and precious entity: The perfect pop song. We don’t use that word lightly around here; we’re talking the glorious splendour of Magic fm and Quincy Jones, albeit displayed through a cracked psychedelic lens. Shine on you crazy diamonds!

Gigwise (GW): So, how are things in the world of Mystery Jets?

Blaine Harrison (BH): “Things are really good, we’re not actually based on Eel Pie Island anymore, we’ve decamped to various parts of London but things are going well”

GW: I see- Do you have any plans to recreate the infamous ‘Eel Island Parties’ anywhere? I hear that the neighbours started to complain.

BH: “We don’t really have any plans to continue that, we took those parties as far as we could, they were amazing and it was all about escaping the London pub scene. It was a way of letting people come to us instead and for our mates to watch 10 bands in one night”. 

O.K then, enough of the past- We’re all about looking forward. The conversation turns towards their forthcoming second album (‘Twenty One’), which was recorded with Electro pioneer and all round Renaissance man Erol Alkan. Blaine becomes very animated when we ask him about what Erol brought to the process.

BH: “The thing about Erol is that his knowledge of music is just completely out there, he is into everything”

“As you know, he is largely known for electro music and we used to go to his night ‘Trash’ regularly. That’s how we first got involved with him, by going to the night and giving him our demo CD, which he would play without listening to first. He takes risks like that and as a result, things that shouldn’t really work end up working in the studio. The album isn’t a dance record, as a producer he brought out the real pop elements”.

GW: We can’t help but notice- The new material sounds unashamedly pop (check out current single ‘Your love’ featuring Laura Marling) - A little more straightforward then their debut. So, was it the intent to create something timeless and more immediate this time?

BH: “The first record was really fun but we didn’t want to make that all over again. We wanted it to be clearer with less embellishment, for things to jump out and not have layers and layers so it is stripped down, which is a very pop thing to do. We were inspired by a lot of pop music from the 80’s, where people seemed to have more license to do weird stuff and get into the charts. If you look at that era, there are a lot of one hit wonders and great pop songs.

We’ve been listening to Magic FM, they play some amazing pop tunes and we were inspired by the sound of producers like Trevor Horn and Quincy Jones.

When we first started out, I wanted us to be a progressive rock, heavy psychedelic band but you move on and we don’t want to repeat that.

The first record is like a spaghetti junction motorway, we aimed for a different, straighter road this time”