You could call it confidence and credit by association, or you could just call it a big mouth and some famous mates. Either way, it's a combination that's doing well for Jon McClure, aka the Reverend: Sheffield scenester, Arctic Monkeys associate and preternaturally self- assured singer and, ahem, poet. So here are his band, barely 18 months in existence, selling out 1,000-plus capacity venues and doing a decent job of acting like they own the place when they get there.

McClure could not sound more Sheffield if he tried; but he also couldn't sound much more like that star pal of his, Alex Turner. It is not just the accent, but the phrasing and the lyrical mode that recall the Arctics' singer so clearly. It's all 'leccy bills, tatty seaside B&Bs and vaguely romantic dole-queue laments ... and it is all a bit pat. It is certainly a few rungs down the ladder from Turner, inspiration-wise; between songs he does the odd spoken-word bit, one of which seems to be some kind of limerick about the new cabinet. OK, maybe the majority of rock lyrics are effectively bad poetry, but this is effectively, figuratively and quite literally bad poetry.

Musically, the shimmering guitars and indie-funk tendencies are rooted in 20 years' worth of dance-friendly north-country bands - Happy Mondays, the Charlatans, more lately Kasabian. But again, it is a step down - the factory-setting keyboard sounds and the mediocre terrace-chant choruses never hit top notch. The single, Heavyweight Champion of the World (you might be getting the cut of McClure's jib by now), ends with a big singalong about being "like everybody else". A warning, or an unwitting admission of guilt? The Makers may be packing them in, but unprecedented or incomparable they certainly are not.

· At the Secret Garden festival on Friday (0870 264 3333), then touring.