Attack! Attack! UK: The Latest Fashion

I don’t know what the competition was like for the Best British Newcomer Award at the 2009 Kerrang! Awards, for which Attack! Attack! UK were nominated, but apparently the Kerrang! editorial board favors crisply produced, manifestly competent and totally uninspiring modern rock, constructed in the shadow of the mighty (for these times) Foo Fighters and best consumed soundtracking a beach montage on 90210 or blasting out of a speaker from the third stage of the Dr Pepper Presents The Sound of Tomorrow Today tour (with Mother 13!). Sure, it’s catchy, but it’s also passionless, clichéd and forgotten as soon as it’s heard. Song titles include: “No Excuses”, “Not Afraid” and “No Tomorrow”, while elsewhere the band triumphs over haters (hi, guys!) on “My Shoes” and realize they’re their own worst enemy on “Nemesis”. If these sons-of-Foo acts want to stand half a chance of being remembered, they’ve got to master the hooks as well as the edge.