Who they are: Vocalist Anday McCarron wandered stateside from his native Glasgow and made New York his home, finding bassist James Elliott, guitarist Jeff Thall, and drummer Chad Royce. What happened next was the formation of a band that, hopefully, would conquer all. Well, it conquered Maverick, and sometimes, the conquering of a label like that is half the battle.

What you can expect: Wall-of-sound guitars, vocals ranging from guttural growl to screaming wail, paeans to girls, madness, illness, suicide. A curious discovery: eight of the album's eleven tracks refer to either God or Jesus, both exhortative and putative, as subject or object. Granted, the location of God is modern rock isn't exactly known because it's usually a secular undertaking. That isn't to say that one isn't allowed to have questions. Most musicians try to at least speak to God once in a while, if only to tell Him what they think of him (sample lyric: "Oh God, yeah, yeah, yeah. My God is so dumb" from "Dumb") or at least to compare His existence to their experience ("You're playing Jesus but you don't know how" from "Playing Jesus") or sometimes just to make sure we know our hero is just like Him ("See God and me we don't wear halos anymore, anymore. Call the priest. Tell him my thoughts they are deceased" from "Halo").

The lyrics don't get much different from these; self-reflection or ego trip? I think it's a little of both. So is this more of the derivative crap that follows in the wake of one successful formula? Maybe, maybe not; the specter of the sound that Manchester built is alive and well. It didn't die with My Bloody Valentine, but there's only so much that a listen to the Verve will tell you.

For the rest of the story, track down The Stone Roses. All you need to know is, what could have been was not, because it was a little ahead of the curve. Then, five years later, came The Bends. Game over.

The music here shows potential, but it sounds too much like everything else. Nothing really grabs me, nothing really shakes me up, nothing about it really impresses me. Much of it is still indistinguishable noise. I've listened to this at least ten times in a row trying to find something to pull out of it and I'm just not hearing it.

The sound that Swimmer is trying to launch their career with lands somewhere smack in the middle of the territory that Radiohead staked out some time ago (in an arena that Lush almost grabbed two years earlier). The point is, the listeners are picky. They're also fickle. There also aren't that many of them. This is not the record that's going to bring throngs of listeners to their knees. Not that every record made needs to be like that.so where does this fit in? Unfortunately, I don't think that this is the standout that it needs to be in a crowded pack that's got better offerings. To my ears, this band is cultivating a sound I've heard before and been bored by; one subject to the peer pressure of the Technicolor-haired uber-hip downtown crowd for too long. Hopefully, instead of being caught up in someone else's scene, they'll be able to create their own on the next try.