Back in 2005 Jay and Jeff Aust and John Ross wanted to challenge the boundaries between punk and hardcore and they created Ambitions. Ambitions played several shows and in September 2006 they released the EP Question. This EP caught the attention of  record label Bridge Nine. After completing the line-up of the band with Jake Woodruff and Keith �Mad Dog� Sidorowizc and hitting the road with Modern Life Is War amongst others I now have got their full-length debut Stranger in my hands. 

I heard some positive stories about their first EP, so I was really curious about this one. According to the bio Stranger will challenge the definition of what is hardcore and what is punk. After listening a few times I still didn�t find the challenge though� The music they make is just a continuation of Ignite and sometimes a little bit of Comeback Kid. Unfortunately enough Ambitions isn�t of the same calibre as those two and therefore I couldn�t get into their music that much. 

Overall this is a really decent album, but I think this is the kind of record you buy, listen to it the entire day and after that day you put it with your other CDs and forget about it. The intro of �The Illusion� for example does remind me a lot of the intro of Comeback Kid�s �False Idols Fall� and this comparison raises the expectations way too much. The clean vocals of Jay Aust also aren�t that impressive. The screams are way better, but they aren�t used that much. 

This five-piece band proves that they can play, but there are way better bands in the same genre, so Stranger will probably end up in a cupboard covered with dust.