★★★☆☆

Where did all the girl groups go? With solo powerhouses like Beyoncé, Ariana Grande and Taylor Swift snapping up the biggest Top 40 hits, there is not much room for a five-piece like Fifth Harmony at the top.

Although boy bands made a comeback with One Direction, we have not seen a girl group climb the charts since Destiny’s Child’s final album “Destiny Fulfilled,” in 2004. With a single in the iTunes Top 50 and a relatively positive public response to their debut album, ”Reflection,” it looks like Fifth Harmony have a chance to follow in those stiletto-ed footsteps. Their first full-length album shows promise with a versatile style and impressive vocals from every member.

Some of their other hits, including “Sledgehammer” and “Worth It,” have gained popularity and can be heard among mainstream music fans. These two dance tracks have earned their place as party staples. The rest of the songs are also danceable, but these two standouts have nudged Fifth Harmony into the spotlight.

Unfortunately, they do not lead off the album with such a song. The synth riffs of the album’s opener, “Top Down,” suggest this group has nothing terribly original to offer. They struggle to rhyme pop buzzwords like “ride” and “style” and squeeze lyrics out of the typical themes of drinking, partying and boys.

The good material emerges as the album progresses, and many of the later tracks rise from the haze of cliches and manage to do something new with the pop genre. The title track “Reflection,” for instance, starts off sounding like a typical love song glorifying some guy’s swagger and style. The girls turn this right around with the hook — “Boy I ain’t talkin’ about you / I’m talking to my own reflection” — making this potentially insignificant tune into the kind of pump-up song to belt into a hairbrush on a Saturday night.

These kinds of positive, girl-power lyrics are the strongest aspect of the album. “Them Girls Be Like” is all about forgetting trivial things like social media affirmation and appearances. “Brave, Honest, Beautiful” stays true to the track title by delivering a straightforward message of female empowerment while name-dropping famous women who embody that spirit: “You can dance like Beyoncé / You can shake like Shakira /’cause you’re brave.” The five singers back up the girl-power message with forceful vocals, each with their own unique vocal flavor.

The versatility of the voices in this group — from sugar-sweet soprano to soulful alto — lends a lot of musical diversity to the album. As the tracks roll on, touches of jazz and R&B come in, and the occasional throwback harmony recalls the glory days of the girl-power band. They have put in an honest effort to mix up their traditional poppy dance tracks with jazzier ballads like “Everlasting Love.” This eagerness for variety is jarring in songs like “This is How We Roll,” which begins with a strumming guitar that could have been ripped from a sun-soaked One Direction sing along, but changes abruptly when a thumping bass drops in. Other than that, the genre mixing does not interfere with the continuity of Fifth Harmony’s girl-party sound.

It is obvious that they have been influenced by the pop goddesses. “BO$$” emulates Beyoncé’s unapologetically empowering style, and many other tracks carry her distinctive defiance. “Like Mariah” calls back to yet another female powerhouse, and “Sledgehammer” scans like an Ariana Grande love song, possibly explaining its relative success in reaching the Top 40 Billboard charts. Some vocals even borrow Iggy Azalea’s trademark grit. The group enlisted another icon to help them out; the album closes with a track featuring Meghan Trainor, who also wrote a few of their songs.

It is clear that this group has come a long way from their third-place performance on the TV show “The X Factor” back in 2012. Their sound has matured from The Cheetah Girls vibe of their early covers to a more polished and powerful femininity. With their current standing on the charts, they have the chance to revive the girl-power band and join the ranks of Destiny’s Child and the Spice Girls, but they have to deliver a lot more punch if they want their sound to be the survivor.