Mystery Jets review, A Billion Heartbeats: An empowering message of positivity

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You’ve got to feel for Mystery Jets. The London-based band postponed the release of their sixth album due to their frontman Blaine Harrison’s hospitalisation back in September, only to then release it as Covid-19 hurtles towards peak devastation in the UK. And back in February, their founding member and guitarist William Rees quit.

But I hope this excellent album gets the kudos it deserves. In an interview last year, the band – who emerged on the indie scene in 2003 – said they wanted A Billion Heartbeats to “feel like it was punching you in the face”.

Reflecting on recent years’ political protests in the capital (including the NHS, Black Lives Matter and Europe), this is an album which sounds as big as its subject matter.

A blast of full-throttle indie-rock, “Screwdriver” starts the album as it means to go on, with an empowering message of positivity as it tackles alt-right intolerance.

Blaine powerfully delivers lyrics such as “hate masquerading as pride”, as a distorted riff, pounding drums, high-pitch vocals and searing guitar combine. It’s followed by the equally energising call to arms, “Petty Drone”, on which a soaring chorus tempers the muscular, driving guitar.

The arena-reaching anthems keep coming. “History Has Its Eye on You” shows off the band’s masterful production, colourfully layering distant synths, reverse guitar and overdubbed vocals to create its expansive sound.

Bolstered by brass, the title track asks, “Every human has a billion heartbeats/ So why do we lie and cheat till we’re old/ And time is up on Earth?”

Save for the underwhelming “Campfire Song”, there are plenty of hooks to get caught up in here. The acoustic strum of the melodic “Cenotaph” is no less compelling, while the dramatic and resplendent piano-and-synth-led finale, “Wrong Side of the Tracks”, has more than something of a U2 stadium-filling epic about it.

The band may have achieved Ivor Novello and Mercury Prize nominations, as well as their highest chart position, with 2016’s Curve of the Earth, but A Billion Heartbeats aims higher, and doesn’t miss.