Mystery Jets Speak About Their New Pop Record

Mystery Jets frontman Blaine Harrison has been speaking to Gigwise about the band’s upcoming new album ‘Twenty One’ and he admits that it is unashamedly a pop record.

Harrison explained that the Eel Pie Island outfit’s previous effort ‘Making Dens’ went off at a few too many tangents, so this time round they decided to hone things down.

He told us: “The first record is like a spaghetti junction motorway, lots of different roads crossing over each other. We aimed for a different, straighter road this time.

“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.

“It is not a bad thing, we were inspired by a lot of pop music from the 80’s, where people seemed to have more licence 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.”

Harrison went on to speak of the influence of their producer Erol Alkan, who recorded the entire album with the band.

Harrison said: “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.”

‘Twenty One’ is released through 679 Records on March 24. It’s preceded by the single Young Love, featuring Laura Marling, on March 10.