Broken Bells Working On Second Album

James Mercer has revealed that Broken Bells are currently working on their second album.

Formed by Danger Mouse and The Shins' frontman James Mercer, Broken Bells were one of last year's most talked about collaborations. Pairing a hip hop producer with an indie rock vocalist, the match seemed to work.

Broken Bells released their debut album last year to widespread acclaim, with the duo recently playing a handful of British dates. Now James Mercer has confirmed that he is writing material for a potential second album.

"We need to do another record, for sure, because we've got these songs we need to put out," he explained to Billboard.

"We've got these songs that aren't B-side type stuff, definitely ones we want on a record. And we enjoy this. It's fun. I think (Danger Mouse) enjoys it, too. It's so enjoyable...It's like a vacation - although I don't want my wife to know that! We definitely will keep working together."

"I don't really write anything ahead of time for Broken Bells" he continued. "We just go into the studio and start improvising. There have been a couple things that have strayed from that, but mostly we sit down in the studio and start working and see what happens."

However before this happens, James Mercer has confirmed that he is preparing to begin work on a new album by The Shins. "I think the next thing I do will be a Shins record," he explained.

"I guess we're on hiatus now," Mercer added, "so I have to sort of allocate time to do it and still do what we have to do with (Broken Bells). But that's made me feel excited about doing Shins stuff again. It's been inspiring I want to take some of (Danger Mouse's) approach and apply it to my (Shins) work."

Broken Bells are set to play the following shows:

June
21 London Royal Festival Hall (Meltdown)
22 Brighton Digital
24 Cornwall Eden Project
25 Glastonbury Festival

Click here to buy tickets for Broken Bells!