The Mystery Jets

Mystery Jets
Mystery Jets in 2009
Background information
Origin	Eel Pie Island, Twickenham, London, England
Genres	Indie rock, post-punk revival, indie pop, psychedelic rock, new prog
Years active	2003–present
Labels	Caroline International (current), Rough Trade, 679 Artists, Transgressive Dim Mak (former)
Website	http://www.mysteryjets.com/
Members	Blaine Harrison William Rees Kapil Trivedi Henry Harrison Jack Flanagan
Past members	Kai Fish Tamara Pearce-Higgins Peter Cochrane Matt Park

Mystery Jets are an English indie rock band, formerly based on Eel Pie Island in Twickenham, London. The band consist of Blaine Harrison (vocals, guitar and keyboards), William Rees (guitar, vocals), Jack Flanagan (bass) and Kapil Trivedi (drums).

The band's first line-up consisted of Blaine Harrison on drums, William Rees on guitar and Henry Harrison (Blaine's father) on bass. Henry became a second guitarist in the band and they were joined by Kai Fish on bass and Tamara Pearce-Higgins on the organ. Kai joined the band after suggestions that they needed a bassist (he played the cello originally). Their original name was The Misery Jets, which was taken from an Evening Standard headline (Eel Pie Island is under the Heathrow flight path, where planes can be frequently spotted). It got changed to Mystery Jets when Blaine accidentally misspelled the name while painting it on a drum skin.

The band at this time recorded an eponymous EP with Aswad producer Nick Sykes. They would practise in the boat shed built by Henry on land he bought after a hippie commune on Eel Pie Island burnt down. Blaine (whose voice had yet to break) took lead vocals. Tamara left the band, and Blaine switched from drums to keyboards. The band had a brief stint with a friend of Williams' (known only as Max) on drums, but he was unreliable and for a time a drum machine was used. The band advertised on internet message boards for a drummer and found Kapil Trivedi. Kapil is not from Eel Pie Island like the rest of the members, but rather Wembley, North London. He found out about the band through his drum teacher. Mystery Jets draws influences from Hall and Oates,Syd Barrett, and Pink Floyd. William Rees has named Robert Fripp, Adrian Belew, Jimi Hendrix, and David Bowie as his guitar inspirations. Much attention has been drawn to their hosting of a series of parties, dubbed "The White Cross Revival", on Eel Pie Island.