Buried underneath heaps of hype from the second their familiar keyboard driven single “Honest Mistake” hit the airwaves back in 2005, New York’s The Bravery were anointed rock’s next big thing before most people had even heard of them.

After all, the track was discovered by a DJ on Britain’s famed Radio 1, and it soon left that country’s infamously giddy rock press salivating.

“Over there if they play a song on Radio 1 the whole country gets to hear it and with all the magazines … they just latch onto things and they take off really fast,” front man Sam Endicott said over the phone. “It was really quite amazing.”

While the group’s self-titled debut tapped into the zeitgeist of the moment – sparsely arranged ’80s-inspired pop rock – and was a moderate modern rock hit, the band never exploded onto the mainstream the way its Brit backers had hoped. For this reason 2007’s “The Sun and the Moon,” has flown much more stealthily under the radar. However, the effort, delivers on a much grander scale.

There is still an underlying ’80s theme reinforced by Endicott’s crooning (Morrissey) vocal stylings, but “The Sun and the Moon” isn’t just for hipsters and retro-rockers with tight jeans and Member’s Only jackets. There are fast songs, slow songs dance songs and rockers that lead you to believe this is a band hitting its stride. By Paul Saitowitz