The story of how a band formed is usually a fairly formulaic tale. One member wrote some songs, had a mate who could play drums, friend from school with a bass… two plus two equals an answer that reels off the practised tongue like muscle memory.

But Young Magic are different. The story of how they met and began making music is a long tour from Australia, across Europe and the US, and down into Mexico, finally settling back in New York as a two Australians – Isaac and Michael, alongside Indonesian-born Melati.

Melt is less a debut, more a collection of singles and b-sides that acts like an audio diary of their travels. Collected sounds and styles span thirty-five minutes, each song evolving through inference and influence. As such, it’s quite difficult to pigeonhole the cornerstones of Young Magic’s music. When I first saw them play live, and before I knew their back story, it was in fact Australia’s Kyu that sprang to mind – their textured vocals and percussive undertows echoing through the work of the could-be Yanks. It’s probably coincidence, but as with Goyte’s current hit, it feels like musicians from down-under have begun embracing styles from far further afield, Young Magic being of similar ilk.

Melt’s prophecy is all in the title: a giant scrapbook of sounds and ideas burnt down into a collection of eleven songs. The only problem with this, though, is that it feels a little disjointed and fails to guide the listener with any momentum through the record. Its eclecticism, while making for an interesting listen, is also disorientating.

Taken track by track however, the songs explore deep into layers of glossed production and fill headphones with spaced, sampled bliss. It spills and surrounds with real beauty, intuition, and ability. On paper they’d have all the makings of an early Animal Collective, for example, but Melt delivers with a much more commercial capability.

It’s interesting to see where the group will go from here. With touring comes many more chances to collect those sounds and expose their ears to new genres, but at the same time it would be nice to hear something fully coherent. If we can take one thing from Melt, though, it’s the assurance that it’ll be an interesting story nonetheless.