Here we have Portsmouth-based rockers Kodiak Jack, riding on the success of two sold out EPs they offer up their debut long player, 'Your Death, My Glory', for my appraisal. Kodiac Jack deal in no nonsense grunge-tinged classic rock and I'm hoping it's more Velvet Revolver than Nickelback, if you know what I mean.

Opener 'Crossfire' hits with a sludgy, heavy Jerry Cantrell-inspired riff but is more musically akin to early Stone Temple Pilots, the vocals of Bryn Roberts not too far removed from Scott Weiland's trademark style. The rhythm section of Matt Forster (drums) and Kev Farren (bass) are a solid unit for the twin guitars of Jeff Arnold and Jon Karp to lay down fat riffs and screaming solos. It's a decent effort and shows promise from the off. The chuggy intro to 'Wasted Youth' gives way to an arena-sized riff, a great wah-wah drenched solo gives it more guts - it's short, sweet and to the point.

Kodiak Jack shoot straight from the hip, no messing; it's mostly balls to the wall hard rock, no time for straying from the path. Things barely slow down, even the slow picked intro to 'Anthem For The Underclass' leads into, like the title suggests, an anthemic beast of a song.

The acoustic led 'My Condition' takes things down a step, stripped down and bare, just guitar and vocals with subtle strings in the background - it's a nice breather before we are back into riffing it up with 'Waves', hints of those other grunge heavyweights Soundgarden in the guitars here, but more commercial sounding. Most of the songs on offer here would not seem out of place on a Velvet Revolver album to be honest. They are well written and arranged, with a good production job.

My only real criticism, and it is just a small one, is that a lot of the opening riffs to songs are generic 'school rock band' style, the overlong 'We Are Your Saviours' suffers from this, as do the similar sounding riffs of 'Waves' and 'Your City To Burn', but again once the drums, etc kick in it all comes together nicely.

The anthemic title track closes the album and is a definite highlight; with its instant gang vocal melodies it gets my head nodding and my foot tapping as I type. More fitting in with the modern sound of say Lostprophets, it's catchy, instant and a future radio hit in waiting.

Kodiak Jack have created a top notch debut album, chock-a-block with catchy anthems for a disenchanted youth of today. Songs like 'Wasted Youth', 'Your City to Burn' and 'Anthem For The Underclass' are topical song titles for a start. They may well have that little something that could see them rise above their contemporaries, a small town band with big aspirations who just maybe could, with time, take their modern arena rock sound to the arenas.

www.kodiakjack.co.uk