Mystery Jets are built to a strict formula for the successful contemporary UK indie-rock band. Take the Stone Roses’ gang mentality and vague sense of ambition, add some polite early-Floyd whimsy, a dash of Lydon sneer, and top off with some Talking Heads twitch and New Order melancholy. Also, let’s not forget that passion for electronic music, which frequently amounts to little more than tacking a few clicks and squiggles onto Doors-Beatles hybrid.
A critic more cynical than myself may argue that the band’s ability to adopt a wide range of hip influences is their sole compelling feature, but this is not entirely true. Aside from the obviousness of their inspirations, Mystery Jets are not the most gifted rock synthesists, but, they do manage to throw up a smattering of enjoyable moments throughout Making Dens.
‘You Can’t Fool Me Dennis’ begins with some jangly, REM-ish guitar, before morphing into a jerkier and far more enjoyable slice of raucous pop. ‘Soluble In Air’ and ‘Horse Drawn Cart’ are the best examples of traditional songcraft on the record, the former a heartwarming, torch ballad, the latter a gorgeously melancholic drunken sea-shanty.
Still, there is something undeniably over-familiar about the Mystery Jets’ brand of eccentricity. Take penultimate track ‘Alice Agnes’ for example – an epic that includes Beach Boys harmonies, choppy punk-pop, Beatles melodicism and Velvets swoon. In theory, an astonishing piece of music. In reality, a surprisingly forgettable genre(s) exercise. One can follow an all-too-clear path through contemporary British rock – from The Coral all the way up to Arctic Monkeys – that leads to the Mystery Jets, and renders this album curiously devoid of, ahem, mystery.