Since the release of their debut EP, Five Minutes With Arctic Monkeys, in May 2005, the band — vocalist/guitarist Alex Turner, guitarist Jamie Cook, bassist Andy Nicholson and drummer Matthew Helders — has been enjoying a British chart run that mimics the early momentum of the Beatles and Duran Duran.

"What's happened has been proper hysterical," Turner says. "If I say 'phenomenon' it sounds like I'm right up my own (behind), but we'd be daft to act like we didn't realize how incredible the last year's been."

By the time the Arctic Monkeys released their debut album, Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not, in January in the United Kingdom (the U.S. release followed a month later), the band already had two top-charting singles, I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor and When the Sun Goes Down.

Anticipation for the album helped sell almost 364,000 copies in its first week to become the fastest-selling debut in UK-chart history. At February's Brit Awards, the British equivalent of the Grammys, the group became the first to win awards for best new band and best British band in the same year.

Not bad in a country where the rock lineage includes the Who and the Rolling Stones.

"Before the hysteria started, labels would say, 'I like you, but I'm not sure about this bit, and that song could do with this changing,' " Turner says. "We never listened."

Blessed with the sass of the Smiths and just a hint of Oasis' brashness, the Arctic Monkeys haven't reinvented the wheel on Whatever People Say I Am. . . . If anything, they kept the 13-song set simple, witty and filled with guitar licks as thick and sugary as butterscotch.

I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor has a ska beat surrounded by electric guitar bombast and Turner's pop-culture poetry. Lines like "Oh there ain't no love, no Montagues and Capulets" are clever, familiar and full of imagery. Fake Tales of San Francisco, with its new-wave guitars, and the dramatic When the Sun Goes Down have hooks that stain the brain after only one or two times.

The reaction in the U.S. hasn't equaled the British hysteria, but first-week sales did send the Arctic Monkeys to No. 24 on the Billboard Top 200 albums and helped Whatever People Say I Am . . . become the second-fastest selling independent debut in U.S.-chart history. At the annual South By Southwest music festival in Austin in March they were easily the most anticipated band of the 1,400 booked for the event.

As with most of the best British rock and pop imports, American ears are a little late to catch on. Tonight's sold-out show at Warehouse Live will probably be the first and last time the Arctic Monkeys play such an intimate setting in Houston. By next year they will most likely be playing to capacity crowds in arenas and amphitheaters.

A year as the darlings of alt-rock hasn't come without some sacrifice. Citing fatigue after months of nonstop tour, bassist Nicholson is sitting out this North American trip. Nick O' Malley took overtwo weeks ago. The show at Warehouse Live will be his 10th with the band. It's unclear how temporary (or permanent) the switch is.

If Nicholson doesn't return, it's possible Brit-pop fans may one day speak of him with the same deep sighs of missed opportunity reserved for early fifth Beatle Pete Best and original Duran Duran lead singer Stephen Duffy.

With the success of I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor and When the Sun Goes Down, and the steam the band is now gathering in the United States, it's not a stretch to think the Arctic Monkeys are poised to carry the sacred British Invasion torch.