James Mercer has revealed the reasons between the departure of Jesse Sandoval and Marty Crandall from The Shins for the band's new album.

Fans were surprised to see that the pair were not present when the band took to the stage for the first date of their spring US tour in Washington on Saturday night (May 2).

In there place were Joe Plummer of Modest Mouse and Grand Archives/Fruit Bats man Ron Lewis.

Speaking to Pitchfork today, Mercer revealed that the changes were for purely sonic reasons surrounding The Shins' new material and that there had been no fall out with Crandall or Sandoval.

He explained: "I started to have production ideas that I wanted to do that basically required some other people.

"It's mainly about that. It's an aesthetic decision. It's kind of hard to talk abut stuff like that, isn't it? Because I don't want to bum anybody out. I'm on good terms with those guys, I hope to maintain that."

He added: "I wouldn't say I'd never work with them again. I love working with those guys."

Both Lewis and Plummer are set to stay on board for the full tour and relaase of the next album, which has an expected release date of early 2010 and will come out via Mercer's own label.

Describing the new material, Mercer went on to say: "It's a lot more up-tempo stuff. I haven't really got any real ballad-y stuff right now. I've got 30 songs and none of them are real slow.

“I think maybe, I'm not so melancholy lately. I'm real happy. I've been lucky in love and I've got a wonderful kid now and things have been going well. Some of the songs are sort of aggressive in a new wave way. I'm excited about it."

(by Daniel Melia)