If Oasis are Brit pop's Beatles, then Embrace are that genre's Bread. The latest funny-haircut next big thing from the U.K., Embrace drag out all the Brit-pop devices on their debut album, The Good Will Out – from the obvious Beatles references (the Sgt. Pepper's-style orchestra tuning up on the album's intro) to Stone Roses-ish hubris ("I Want the World"). The band's derivative penchant doesn't end there. "My Weakness Is None of Your Business" might as well be a cover of Oasis' "Champagne Supernova," while "One Big Family" sledgehammers Noel Gallagher soccer-chant choruses into a Verve-style guitar freakout. Embrace's main problem is lack of personality. The band's blandness is compounded by the lack of a charismatic leadman: There's no caustic wit like Jarvis Cocker, no mojo-rising shaman like Richard Ashcroft, no sodden hooligan like Liam Gallagher to drive Embrace's booming, but empty, Big Rock sound. They can scare up a reasonably soaring power ballad like "Higher Sights" (which oddly recalls INXS), yet it's not enough, The Good Will Out may not be Brit pop's last gasp, but it certainly casts no shadow. (RS 793)

MATT DIEHL