Mystery Jets - Twenty One

by Jon Fletcher

Eel Pie Islanders show how a second album should be done

"The influences keep coming - from the reggae overtones of ‘Half In Love With Elizabeth’ to a hint of The Decemberists’ ‘The Crane Wife’ on ‘Behind The Bunhouse’ – but the quality never fails."

For the first 40 seconds of ‘Hideaway’, the opening track on Mystery Jets’ second album, you might be forgiven for thinking you’re listening to the Klaxons. There’s something about the song’s wailing siren that seems to beg out for a shout of “DJ!” and a bass line like a caged tiger. Instead, there’s only a sparse beat and a fuzzy riff that opens into a song about illicit gay love, followed by one of the most sensationally engaging pop albums New Noise has heard in a long time.

The Dad may have retired to the sidelines, but the rest of Mystery Jets have grown up to fill his shoes. There are parts of ‘Twenty One’ that show a tongue in cheek worldliness we haven’t seen from this band before, effortlessly meshing gentle emotion with gentle humour. Nowhere is this truer than on the opener, which combines thinly veiled innuendo with a sense of genuine heartache: “I’ve been hiding behind the blinds / But in my mind don’t want to be that kind of guy”.

The vocal delivery on this track owes much to Bloc Party, which is not meant as a criticism – this is an album that borrows widely but always with deference and skill, as at home with the Beach Boys-meets-Bananarama pop pomposity of ‘Two Doors Down’ as it is with the agonised barking of Kele et al.

There is a real sense that this is collection of stories, not just of songs. Moments of pure, unadulterated joy are offset by moments of aching sadness, as on the crackly, piano-led hidden track, the lyrics of which seem to reference the self-harming misery alluded to by the album cover: "You're close to the edge but you're holding on / Well do yourself a favour don't do yourself any harm".

'Young Love’, a summery duet with the ubiquitous but equally endearing Laura Marling, is a standout song, but then it’s difficult to pick out a bad track. The influences keep coming - from the reggae overtones of ‘Half In Love With Elizabeth’ to a hint of the Decemberists’ ‘The Crane Wife’ on ‘Behind The Bunhouse’ – but the quality never fails.

This album might as well come with a money back guarantee. Splendid.

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