Song For Isolation

Mitchell Museum’s new album was made for lockdown life

making a Mitchell Museum album: complex psych-pop melodies which, for all the band’s experimentation, retain a tunefulness and clarity at their core.

Take lead single Freakbeak, a cut-and-paste sonic collage of screams and backwards baby babbles, which, when you turn your ears just so, coalesces into a kaleidoscopic chorus.

Or Footsteps 101 – inspired, says Cammy, by effectively having to re-learn to walk following a hospital stay – on which drummer Raindeer, Cammy’s younger brother, leads the band in a lurching, lop-sided dance.

The effect, I suggest to Cammy, is similar to that of “magic eye” art: abstract from up close, with the true picture starting to emerge only when you step back.

“There’s a lot going on in the stuff we do,” Cammy agrees. “But I think if you’re just working with loops sometimes the music can become quite static. Without the drums and the bass we wouldn’t sound like Mitchell Museum.”

“Usually, I’ll write demos that are just me and the synth and some loops and samples. I’ll take it to Kris and

Raindeer, who’ll put a bow on it with the drums and bass.

“There have been times when I’ve taken a song to the guys and they’re like, ‘What is going on?’ Then they help me shape it into something that makes sense to people.

“Sometimes what’s in my head doesn’t translate well into a demo,” he says.

“Something that’s always in my mind is that I want people to enjoy a catchy song. All the other stuff comes after, to make it that little bit more interesting, and maybe a little bit more challenging as well.”

It doesn’t get much more challenging than stolen screams or, as Cammy puts it, “my friends as a new instrument”.

Luckily, none of the people who inadvertently provided part of the album’s backdrop objected.

“That would have been a nightmare – can you imagine?” says Cammy, envisaging an alternative timeline in which he had to re-record the material.

“Just me, shouting in my kitchen? How embarrassing.” Skinny Tricks by Mitchell Museum is out now on

“I like to write lyrics that can be surreal” quite