In my mind I’d like Stevie R. Pearce to be this generation’s Steve Jones; a lovable layabout with a knack for a catchy riff and a cheeky grin. In reality, Pearce is much more than that. But I can’t help thinking if he was a bit more like the bloke in my imagination he’d be a global superstar by now…

But enough of this idiocy. For those of you who haven’t been paying attention, Stevie R Pearce is the Brit guitarist in Yank bands Warrior Soul and Love/Hate, but pleasingly his new solo album is Brit yob rock through and through, even if it is leavened on occasion by flashes of pub Americana in the shape of a suitably unhinged version of Johnny Cash’s Folsom Prison Blues

You is a superb piece of British punk, the sort of thing you could see in any rock club on an early eighties weekend played by skinny kids with dyed black hair and an NY Dolls fetish; Nobody Loves You is similarly nostalgic, remembering a youth of Saturday afternoons dallying in the West End before huddling, wasted, around a flea pit stage to worship whichever demi Gods were passing through that week. It’s almost tear jerking in it’s simplicity and honesty, and it’s great.

Same Old Story shifts forward about five years and incorporates some American cock rock swagger to the mixture, with results depending on your tolerance for that kinda stuff. Pearce occasionally sounds like LA Gun Phil Lewis in these moments, which ain’t a bad thing I suppose, the cockney sneer adding a bit of gritty authenticity to the Middlesex blooze pouring outta the speakers.

Occasionally Pearce adopts a lazy Billy Duffy chug, occasionally a bit of Mick Ronson flash, but for the most part he’s a dependable, solid as fuck player with a similarly mid-table voice to go with the six string smarts. Set My Soul On Fire is pop punk for a twenty first century British constituency, Til Something Better Comes Along a world-weary dose oF dole queue realism that adds a slightly surreal U2 gloss to proceedings; However wherever you drop the needle there’s interest, and I have to say that, for all my ribbing I’ll be returning to this album a fair bit in the coming weeks. Not bad at all.

Stevie R. Pearce and the Hooligans is out on March 23rd on Cargo Records