Featuring former members of With Honor, Ambitions have a lot to live up to. After releasing an under-the-radar EP on Think Fast! Records the band inked a deal with Bridge 9, a label certainly attracting some attention in recent months after a string of stellar releases. In places ‘Stranger’ is nothing short of sensational. There’s an obvious link to With Honor in the sense there’s an urgency and unbridled passion, but musically the two bands aren’t that similar. The press release links them more to Fugazi and Dag Nasty, which I don’t agree with, but there’s less of a traditional hardcore influence than their former band.
‘Between Breaths’ is perhaps a very good introduction to Ambitions – a song which changes pace so often it shows the band are far from a one trick pony. The change in pace actually keeps this 13-tracker sounding fresh; it’s not a particularly long album in any case, but there are plenty of ideas here to warrant multiple listens. Closing rack ‘Redemptive Soul’ even sounds a little like Pearl Jam. While Crime In Stereo recently ripped up the hardcore rulebook and did something very, very different for them, Ambitions don’t quite hit the same high notes. Some of the tracks are a little wishy-washy and there are a couple in the middle section of this record that never really get going. But on the whole this is well worth checking out.