If you thought you had Lostprophets sussed based on their first release The Fake Sound Of Progress you'd better abandon those preconceptions. Begin afresh with the Welsh sextet's second release Start Something , a scintillating collage of hardcore, pop, breakbeat, and metal. It's not just an impressive creative leap, it's one of the most adventurous rock albums to arrive this year.

That's what happens when a group of young musicians - Ian Watkins (vocals), Mike Lewis (guitar), Lee Gaze (guitar), Stuart Richardson (bass), Mike Chiplin (drums), and Jamie Oliver (keyboards.programming) - get a chance to hone their musicianship via three years of non-stop touring.

The band's initial foray into the studio in 2000 was as six naïve, small-town kids armed with raw enthusiasm and a grab-bag of influences ranging from the hardest guitar rock to an unapologetic love for '80s icons like Duran Duran and the Police.

The resultant debut album The Fake Sound Of Progress sold 140,000 in the UK alone, and earned them Kerrang! magazine's Best New British Band 2001 award. The group has since toured the UK , US, Europe and Japan sharing stages with The Used, Glassjaw, Linkin Park , Andrew W.K. and the various heavy hitters of OzzFest 2002. Late last year, they performed for 5000 at London 's Brixton Academy , their largest ever headlining gig.

Since then, they have worked their fingers to the bone fine-tuning their sound. "It used to be riff-riff-riff. We had no idea how to structure a song or what to do," Ian admits, "This time around we learned how to make more coherent songs."

For Start Something , Lostprophets joined producer Eric Valentine (Queens Of The Stone Age, Good Charlotte, Smash Mouth) in his Los Angeles studio for four months this year. It was the first time the band actually had a budget. "For the last album it was just: in, record, out," Jamie says. "We didn't have a producer and we'd go in, sing the lyrics and nobody would question anything. This time around, we've made an album in which every single avenue has been explored. Everything has been done to perfection."

The band knew they wanted to make an epic-sounding album, understanding that the opportunity might not arise again in the current industry climate. "I love big, grand, epic bands like Queen" Ian says. "So we've seized the chance while we have it, while everyone's behind us."

And epic it is, whilst still retaining Lostprophets' raw indie edge. Songs like album opener "We Still Kill The Old Way" and "To Hell We Ride" are dizzying in their sonic assault while "Goodbye Tonight" is glorious, New Wave-inspired pop. Single "Burn Burn" is incendiary rock with vein-popping choruses. Many of the songs seem to embrace a clutch of different genres at once - like "Last Train Home", which opens with atmospheric verses before switching gears into an anthemic sing-along, complete with unruly backing vocals from members of Good Charlotte. Elsewhere, strings (courtesy of alt-rock orchestral hero David Campbell) bathe some of the album's harder cuts in an ethereal glow.

Start Something will always keep you guessing. You think you've got a song figured out and then it takes a hairpin turn, maybe to a bone-crushing, full-throated passage, to a weird, ambient interlude or a dramatic piano coda. For Ian Watkins, it's all about following their muse, not some sort of trend: "We're not a post-hardcore band, we're not a nu-metal band, we're not interested in proving anything to anybody. We just want to make music we like."

Start Something is the latest chapter in the Lostprophets'

self-penned success story. "This is us, take it or leave it!" says Jamie. This album is Lostprophets' call to arms, a rallying cry to kids everywhere - never lie down, never give up. As Ian admirably sums up, "Everyone's got dreams. Start something, start anything. Just do what you've always wanted to do."