You’ve heard all this before, haven’t you? It’s very hard to make something entirely new and unique nowadays, without sounding contrived or at least bearing a resemblance to something another band has already done. The Hottness’ blend of hard rock, punk and metal elements is quite an eclectic blend of some of the more glorious moments of heavy music. Progressing along to an undercurrent of driving drum beats, the whole thing just explodes into life, with heavy guitars and screaming there’s an intensive urgency which so many people just fail to ever achieve.

It’s not all heavy, in the typical vain of southern rock bands, The Hottness know exactly when and how to tone everything down and introduce a sweet melody to proceedings. The sense of dynamic that this bestow upon you, the listener is far superior to what many others will ever come close to. The album never really lose that sense of urgency and intensity, parading through ten songs in just under forty minutes. For intensity’s sake it does seem something is lost; see, they are faultless and masters of their craft, but the Wilmington, NC 5-piece’s only major let down is a lack of enduring creativity. It’s almost as if you’ve heard one song and you’ve heard them all. Heavy rock is sometimes tough to break into, for the diehards there is a wealth of variety on here, albeit in the subtleties. From a perspective of somebody discovering a new band, they may not do enough to maintain your attention for the full length of the album.

Despite that slight let down, it’s a very positive album. The Hottness convey a sound of a band who’ve been honing their craft over many years and many albums, but alas, this is their debut full length. By that reckoning there will be a lot more to come in future, this album should be just about enough to tie you over until then.