U.K hard rockers draw from a myriad of influences and fail to hit the heights of any. ONE LAST DAY have come to the world with their debut album, "Chapter 1: The End Is The Beginning" less of a kicking down of the door and more of a polite knock asking to be noticed. It's clear from the off the sort of market this band are trying to corner, U.S rock radio, sounding like the worst of the STONE SOUR and ALTER BRIDGE aping bands out there, but with none hooks and licks to keep listeners interested.

Album opener proper "Burning Inside" begins with a big enough riff, clearly written in the hope of having whole arenas bouncing along to it, but is completely lacking any real punch. The melodic choices in the vocals throughout the record but in this song in particular are strange, there's no other word for it. Where there should be soaring rising hooks there's a flatness, see also the chorus is "This Bottle Got Me" which feels like it should be the big emotional, heartfelt song of pain, struggle and redemption, and ends up sounding more like a wetter version of "How You Remind Me" by NICKLEBACK.

The lyrics really don't help this albums case either, when they are so clear, you'd better make damn sure they are good. Unfortunately we have here a set of lyrics that you could find on the back pages of any 14 year old's school exercise book "I miss you so damn much everyday | I just can not seem to find my way alive" from "With You Again" or "It means so much to me to have you here with no complaining | it feels so right you see in a world so cold" from "Not Ready To Die" amongst many, many other examples. It's all so unrefined and cringeworthy. You have to give it to the singer, he does seem to mean the words, but they're so laughably immature and weightless that it completely loses any of that power it could have.

Instrumentation wise every trick in the hard radio rock textbook has been used. Long ringing open chords in the chorus and short choppy chugging throughout the verses, rises through major keys, intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, guitar solo, chorus and a reprise again. From half way through the opening track you have more or less heard everything this record has to offer for its 31 minutes runtime, it's so formulaic and predictable I feel like I've spent more time listening to it and writing about it than the band did writing it.

Nevertheless, there are always positives to be found, on a production level, this band sounds good, the guitars are clear and clean, the vocals crisp, nothing is overshadowed by anything else and it flows neatly from one track to the next. They sound like they have some budget behind them and I could see this being very successful on the aforementioned, U.S rock radio where they would find a comfortable home. One Last Day are trying to ride the coattails of the success of every rock band of this century who has had any minor hit, taking elements from all of them and forcing them together because surely that must make a hit, and it just falls flat, at every, single, hurdle.