It's only January and already we have one of the most eagerly anticipated British debut albums of the year on our hands. Fresh from recent tours with US giants The Used and Thrice, and with a hugely triumphant EP already in their locker, judgement day is finally here for Essex mob We Are The Ocean. After numerous delays, Cutting Our Teeth arrives and could either make the five-piece this year's You Me At Six and propel them to stardom, or be a colossal let-down that shows the youngsters blew their creative load on their self-titled 2008 EP. While far from perfect, Cutting Our Teeth is undoubtedly the latter, thanks to its instantly accessible blend of energetic post-hardcore guitars, rasping yells and soaring melodies crammed into a short and snappy half-an-hour playing time.

If you've never heard WATO before, first get up from that rock you've been living under; and secondly, listen to album opener and lead single 'Look Alive'. It's a track that will immediately tell you if you're going to take to the band or not, with its clean, intricate guitar lines, and frontman Dan Brown's gruff screams repeatedly giving way to guitarist Liam Cromby's melodic sing-along choruses. Sure it's a rather unsophisticated trick that Alexisonfire have already done to death, but rarely is it pulled off with such aplomb as it is here. Following number 'Our Days Are Numbered' is equally as impressive, one of the heaviest and best moments of WATO's career to date, it illustrates that the band are at their best when they're at their most frenetic and heaviest. Therein lays the main problem with Cutting Our Teeth, in that all too often WATO decide to take their foot off the accelerator and explore slower, more awkward ballad-like territory, take 'Confessions' for example which sounds scarily close at times to the god-awful miserable crooning of Creed.

A bit more killer and little less slow burning filler and Cutting Our Teeth would be a top class album, ultimately then it's just a very good one, and a record that signals the arrival of the UK's next superstars. Move over Lostprophets and Enter Shikari, as there's some new boys in town.

Rating: 4/5 by Dan Jones

Tracklisting

1. Look Alive
2. Our Days Are Numbered
3. All Of This Has To End
4. Confessions
5. These Days, I Have Nothing
6. Don't Take Chances
7. (I'll Grab You By The) Neck Of The Woods
8. Are You Proud Of Me Now?
9. I Used To Be So Much More
10. This Is Called My Home

Further links

We Are the Ocean on MySpace

MySpace page for the fast rising-rockers