Dive Dive - Potential Album Review

Let's get this out of the way early: Dive Dive are perhaps one of the most underrated British rock bands around at the moment. Potential, their third album is once more a prime example of their sheer brilliance, featuring 13 fantastic, jagged, melodic punk gems.

You may know 3 members of Dive Dive as the incredibly trendy folk hero Frank Turner's backing band, but if you were expecting more in that vein, you will be disappointed. What Dive Dive offer is a couple of notches further up the Richter scale, as anthemic album opener Mr 10% attests. This track has a quirky opening riff, followed by an absolutely massive chorus with more laid back verses sandwiched in between. It's a thrilling listen for sure. Recent single Liar follows a similar high energy formula, with angular guitar riffs punctuating the sound.

That isn't to say however, that Dive Dive don't possess a quieter, more thoughtful side. Ape Like Me, one of the albums many, many highlights, taking on a slower tempo with more laid back guitars, interesting lyrics sung in a beautiful emotive harmonies (inspired by Planet of the Apes no less), and did I mention it's got another absolutely huge chorus in it?!

Let's Swap Places, another of the slower songs has been mixed interestingly, with instruments and vocals swapping places (see what they did there?). It shows this amazing band's inventiveness explicitly, not that it needed pointing out.

Potential is an album full of highlights. There is not a single bad song on it and I could write about it for ages, but I'd rather let the music speak for itself. Meet Dive Dive, you're going to like them. Did I mention they were really, really good?


Ben Walton