GA-GAS - BREAKIN’ AMERICA
Case in point, really - wait for a US pop-punk band to come along and two appear at once! In fact, this borrows more from the more mainstream Foo Fighters stable than fitting snugly next to the Rival Schools on the record rack. So much so, it’s a rip off of the mighty Grohl’s own “Learn to Fly” with Feeders “Come Back Around” shoe horned into the chorus. It could be this familiarity that actually has you bouncing along for the first few listens - but like all fast food rock - it’s a matter of minutes before you’re hungry for something else.

FUNERAL FOR A FRIEND - JUNEAU
As we eagerly await a new release from fellow Welshmen the LostProphets, FFAF have ably stepped into the breach but less heavy on the hip-hop and borrowing more from Glassjaw and Thursday. Their debut single is in fact "The Song Formerly Known as Juno” off their last EP but re-recorded giving more crunch to the guitars, and a light-shade quality to the emo-style vocals. Suitably heavy, but less shouty and aimed at getting airplay time - the Prophets can consider their crowns as the Princes of Wales well and truly knocked off. Top Stuff.

MARTA WILLSON - CHOOZA LOOZA
Choose a Loser? I choose you Marta Wilson. Especially if you think you’re going to muscle in on any part of the market that Avril Levigne has cornered with your teenage-chick-angst rock bobbins. Go and join Amy Studt smoking behind the bikesheds and file this under bargain bin.

STAG - GOTTA GET AWAY
Snotty nosed strut-rock, which is stripped to the bare bones in terms of production - guitar, bass, drums, vocals…”Nothing new there then!”, I hear you cry, and you’d be right. Uninspired, unimaginative dirge, which makes you wonder if these guys ever heard of the Buzzcocks or the Jam when they were growing up.

BOWLING FOR SOUP - PUNK ROCK 101
Oh Look! We’ve got a daft name, a comedy fat bloke on guitar and can gurn with the best of them on our single cover….We’ve written some hilarious songs about fancying birds that like Fred Durst, and now we’re doing one about people who’re starting up ‘serious’ punk bands of their own. For crying out loud - Give it a rest will you!!! It’s like the 4 David Brents of Rock. As for the music, even Good Charlotte must be guffawing ever so slightly.

THE KILLS - PULL A U
Their second single from the “Keep on your mean side” LP is dirrrttiiiieerrr than Miss Aguilera could ever hope to be. The guitar line shuffles along with a bottom E buzz, singer VV’s vocals writhing and sleazing over the top. It’s like if Tori Amos could play a mean axe, deciding to jam with the White Stripes. Having already supported the Primals and the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs this year - with tunes like this, the Kills look set for much bigger things.

CRACKOUT - OUT OF OUR MINDS
Follow up to the best-titled single of the year in “You Dumb F##K”, the Oxford three-piece return with a summer anthem, perfect for those all-dayers down the Dog and Duck in much the same way Dodgy’s “Staying out for the Summer” was. British pop - although not Britpop as some would have it - evoking memories of Sleeper, with Steve Eagles’ vocals bringing to mind the Cure’s Robert Smith. Mine’s a pint lads!

STEPHANIE KIRKHAM - INAPPROPRIATE
I should say so. Darn right inappropriate if you think I’m damaging my eardrums with this pap. It sounds like watered down Kym Marsh with a plinky-plonky piano bit (a’la Vanessa Carlton).Just please make it stop.

KRAFTWERK - TOUR DE FRANCE 2003
As it says on the tin - it’s the anthem of this years race - and used on the TV coverage. Starts off very subtly, with a chiming house piano and those robotic vocals that you associate with the ‘Werk. Using very miminal percussion “Tour…” still has the movement and vibrancy which would get a crowd up and moving. Very listenable, but you get the sense if they’d gone a bit more Chemical Brothers with the bass-line, it could’ve been a club smash this summer too.

DAVID GUETTA VS BOWIE - JUST FOR ONE DAY (HEROES)
Cha-ching!!! - This stinks of cash in, big time. Murdering a classic like Bowies’ “Heroes” by stabbing it relentlessly, with a basic bassline and kick-drum, should be a hanging offence. If David Guetta was going for ‘anthem’ then he should’ve just stuck the original on his turntable instead. Dreadful.

Matt Lee