Oregon trio Everclear always managed to be down at the shops when the zeitgeist came knocking, but it seems as if they're finally in the right place at the right time. American rock is currently at its most bankable since grunge, with the last few months witnessing guitars replacing samplers as the sexy instrument and big shorts transmuting into an unalluring fashion statement. Everclear are more unironic-goatee men themselves (although frontman Art Alexakis, who is 38 and should know better, wears the shorts) but in every other sense their moment is now.

"Are there any Everclear fans in the house?" Alexakis asks forlornly, unable to grasp that, after eight years and four albums, his meat-and-potatoes clones are cleaning up.

Temporarily expanded to a six-piece, including an Adam Ant-style extra drummer, they bang through the new record, Songs From an American Movie Vol One: Learning How to Smile. This venture into soft rock has been praised as a departure from their usual thrashing style, but you'd never know it from the treatment meted out to songs such as Wonderful. Clattering along like a slacker anthem, its big choruses are about all that emerge intact. The wry AM Radio acquires a scratchy metalloid patina that makes it unrecognisable. There's no pacing, no variation, no acknowledgement that doing five relentless (albeit rather tuneful) churners in a row might be counter-productive.

But the adolescent fans are delighted to be able to mosh without pause. In fact, when the band briefly slow down for an acoustic jam from the So Much for the Afterglow album, they settle down like impatient schoolchildren. Alexakis seems like a nicer-than-usual rock star, and you'd love to like his music, but the afterglow is conspicuous by its absence.