DICK DIVER - Melbourne Florida LP

Recorded in Apollo Bay with the perennial Mikey Young at the helm, Melbourne, Florida is Melbourne quartet Dick Diver's third full-length outing, after the highly-praised New Start Again (2011) and Calendar Days (2013) albums, both of which scored high on many end-of-year polls. It's a wide-ranging and diverse album, simultaneously smoother and more eccentric than their previous world-conquering efforts: there's a horn section, there's a Tears For Fears-style synth ballad (Percentage Points), and there's even a song co-written with a bona-fide poet. First single Waste The Alphabet, written by guitarist Al McKay with renowned Australian poet Michael Farrell, is a short, sharp pop attack which premiered in December on The Fader, and blazed its way across the internet like a shooting star. On Melbourne, Florida, Dick Diver have really stretched out, creating a bigger, broader Australian sound, one with a foot still entrenched in their musical roots (Go-Betweens, Television, Flying Nun bands, etc.), but one which will undoubtedly find them a wider audience.