Album: The Courteeners, Falcon (A&M Records)

Vacancy. One Mancunian guitar band with a cocky, feather-cut singer called Liam. If the Courteeners didn't exist, the music industry would have had to invent them.

The opener of their second album, cunningly titled "The Opener", is a tale of on-tour homesickness with Liam Fray whining "I miss getting piss-wet through, coming to yours and getting warm". It sets the sweary but substandard tone. This is weak tea indeed. I expected, at least, a bracing rock blast, but Falcon makes Northern Uproar sound like, well, Oasis.