You can sometimes tell what the next big thing out of Britain is going to be by watching television commercials. Case in point: Kasabian, who’ve managed to Moby their way into a Pontiac commercial, the trailer for the upcoming Firefly movie, Channel Five’s automotive show Fifth Gear, the PAL edition of Gran Turismo 4, etc., etc., etc. (It’s interesting to note that three of those four placements have something to do with fast cars—Kasabian: composers for car chases of the new millennium!) With two top-ten singles and a number of Brit Awards nominations, it’s safe to say that Kasabian have hit it big with their Primal Scream meets Stone Roses meets (fill-in-the-blank early-90s Britrock band) formula.

Except for two things: first, in the hyperdramatic British market, there is no such thing as “the next big thing,” because everything is big for at least a couple of seconds, and it’s so hard to keep track for us North Americans that we may as well not bother. Sorry, Atomic Kitten was so two years ago? How the hell were we supposed to know? And that leads us to the second problem: what makes it big in Britain rarely makes it big here, and never for very long. Britain’s adopted pop goddess, Kylie Minogue, made barely a ripple with Fever before promptly disappearing off the American radar again. And just try to think of another British band or artist that’s had anything resembling decent exposure in the past half decade. So what does this mean for Kasabian, who have committed to U.S. tours and placements in American car commercials?