Kevin Bronson on March 23rd, 2011

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As with most purveyors of Britpop over the past two-plus decades, the Hours fashion shimmering rock that doesn’t sacrifice melody for muscle. In this case, the players are rather old hands at this sort of thing – Antony Genn and Martin Slattery have resumés that include stints with Pulp, Elastica, Shaun Ryder’s Black Grape and Joe Strummer’s Mescaleros. Their debut album “It’s Not How You Start, It’s How You Finish” aspires to big themes of redemption and affirmation; from the Suede-like romanticism of “Back When You Were Good” and “These Days” to obvious metaphor of “Ali in the Jungle,” it’s an album that rarely strays from the Britpop canon but does it no shame either.

||| Download: “Ali in the Jungle”

||| Live: The Hours perform Thursday at the Bootleg Theater.