WITH two albums under its belt, the musical journey for American rock band Boys Like Girls seems to be going well.

The band, formed in Massachusetts, United States, gained worldwide recognition after the release of its self-titled album in 2006 and its second album, Love Drunk, in 2009.

In February 2011, the band announced that it was going on a hiatus, as members were involved in their own projects. The announcement shocked fans worldwide, who thought Boys Like Girls had disbanded, which prompted band leader Martin Johnson to tweet otherwise.

Other members are Johnson (lead vocals, rhythm guitar), Paul DiGiovanni (lead guitar, backing vocals), Morgan Dorr (bass guitar) and John Keefe on drums. Dorr is the newest member after Bryan Donahue left to pursue projects with groups Early Morning Blues and The Tower and The Fool.

Boys Like Girls will be releasing its third studio album, Crazy World, which is due for release here in September. The group was in Kuala Lumpur recently for the Rockaway Festival 2012 in Neverland Club in Jalan Kia Peng, Kuala

Lumpur, alongside US-based rock band, Motion City Soundtrack and our own The Azenders, Lab The Rat and An Honest Mistake. A day after the showcase, Press members were invited to its Crazy World album pre-listening session in KL.

At the session, Johnson said the band is now “maturing” in terms of lyrics as well as image. “We just want to showcase our skills as mature songwriters, capable of stretching our music beyond the pop/rock genre,” he said.

One particular track, Life Of The Party, written by Johnson, has a bit of everything. It feels like a combination of different styles drawing from Jack Johnson and Jason Mraz. The song also seems to be influenced by Bruce Springsteen. In Stuck In The Middle (also written by Johnson) the song begins with acoustic guitar strumming before moving on with a different mix of musical instruments.

“Crazy World is a key record for us. It is also a representation of what music means to us — that it is the only thing that gets people together. Most people are on their phones, even when they’re having a meal together. So, to us, music slows down everything.

“It’s (Crazy World) also the most special record — it’s the first album we recorded after we took time off. The songs are very different and speak for themselves. They touch on things that happened to us in the last couple of years,” said Johnson, adding that the band had a tough time choosing the tracks for the album.

“We had over 200 songs to choose from, but we narrowed these down to 11 tracks. We wanted something new that would not disappoint fans.”

Due to perform in Six Flags, St. Louis, Johnson also said some songs “were pretty hard to write”.

“When I wrote the songs, I didn’t know what it’s going to be like. It started off with some melody, followed by some minor blackout moments and then the most amazing things happened. That’s when all the chords and music notes came to you,” he added.

Johnson, who is split between being the band frontman as well as producer for the album, said all the songs were recorded in the studio in his house.

Before leaving, the band members said they also collaborated with “someone” well-known in the industry after their initial collaboration with country pop singer Taylor Swift in Two Is Better Than One (from their Love Drunk album).

“We hope there will be a remix of our songs too. That’ll be fun. But then again, we want to focus on making great music and we want our fans to see a different side of us.”