D.C. indie-rockers The Jet Age gear up to release ‘Destroy.Rebuild’

Largely inspired by America’s current state of affairs, Washington D.C. based trio The Jet Age are getting ready to release their forthcoming record Destroy.Rebuild. The new set of songs address peoples’ struggles to find their way home with themes that feel more prescient every day. The lyrics have a heavy thematic weight yet their sonic landscape fits them perfectly. GroundSounds recently caught up with the guys to talk about their latest project, musical inspirations and more, check out the exclusive interview below.

For those just discovering The Jet Age can you tell us about the formation of the band, how you guys met and started making music?

Greg and I were in a band called the hurricane lamps.  Greg moved to Norway and the band broke up.  A lamps fan—Dave Meyer, now of Denver’s Emerald Siam–offered to play bass with me and brought along drummer Pete.  When Dave moved to Denver, Greg wound up moving back to the States just in time to take over bass duties.

What made you guys decide on the name The Jet Age?

My mother-in-law bought me the original Jason Bourne novel to read on the plane, and the phrase just jumped out at me—it sounds cool.

What do you guys enjoy most about Washington D.C.? What is one local spot every visitor should check out?

The city is fairly small but, as the nation’s capital, it has a lot to offer, including great restaurants, the Smithsonian, parks and jobs. The suburbs also abut the city proper, so you can get houses that accommodate rock bands. In DC, you can’t really pick just one place to visit, but  I will say the Natural History Museum is my favorite part of the Smithsonian.

Can you tell us about the writing and creative process involved with the track “Don’t Make a Sound?”

That was one of the first songs I wrote for the album. It contains the duality of the record, so it really informed the rest of the lyrics.  There are vague allusions to things threatening to go off the rails, while encouraging the listener to cling to his or her loved ones, and that’s really the record in a nutshell: maybe if we embrace love we’ll make it through.

After last year’s Jukebox Memoir—which featured guest appearances from Ride’s Mark Gardener and Swervedriver’s Adam Franklin—I knew I wanted to continue mining my shoegaze roots, so, sonically, this was supposed to resemble Nowhere with, of course, Who power chords on the chorus.

What has it been like working on your latest record Destroy.Rebuild and bringing it to fruition?

It was really rewarding.  We were really proud of Jukebox– every song was written to sound like one of our heroes and we, and critics, felt that we did a really good job –but that meant that, this time out, we had a mission to get back to what we three do intuitively, as opposed to relying on our technical skills to make a “type” of song.  Listening back to Destroy, I think we all felt like this captured us without as much of the record-collecting baggage we’d begun to accumulate after five albums.

How has America’s current state of affairs influenced the album?

Tremendously.  It was impossible to write songs last year and not think about Eric Garner, Baltimore, and the midterm elections, which promised more attempts to keep people oppressed and uninformed while leaving our entire planet vulnerable to every asshole with the money to buy their way into the planetary gang rape.  It was terrifying.  Recent Supreme Court decisions have been thrilling, but then you have Charleston–and \ the subsequent spate of church burnings—and somehow Donald Trump is still up in the polls so, sadly, I think the lyrics have legs.

What was the inspiration behind the track “In Time, All Want Will Cease?”

So, in addition to the country falling apart, some relationships around me also fell apart, and this song asks at what point do your emotional aspirations become an unrealistic fantasy that you’re trying to force your real relationships to accommodate? And that’s not a rhetorical question; I think that can be a difficult distinction to make.  Y’know, at what point does pursuing your dreams become something toxic, and how do you keep unfulfilled dreams from dragging you down?  But then implicit in that is the question of how far do you have to go to make your dreams true? What are they worth to you?

What musicians/bands are you guys currently listening to?

I tend to avoid listening to other music while making our records, but of course I made an exception for the almighty Swervedriver, and I’m glad I did because they inspired me to add a bunch of harmonies at the last minute.  As soon as we finished, I picked up the new Joanna Gruesome and Thee Oh Sees.

After the record release, what’s next for The Jet Age, what can fans look forward to?

I don’t know; I definitely know what direction I want us to go in, but let’s just get this one sold, let’s move some back catalog.  One step at a time!