Worst case scenario is that it's fusel alcohol. You'll know it for a fact if drinking a significant amout gives you a headache in short order. Those flavors will generally not fade with time, unfortunately.
Most likely culprit is fermenting too warm. What beer/yeast was it and how warm was your ambient temp?
Another possibility is you didn't pitch enough healthy yeast, and it produced the fusels out of stress.
Final possibility is that the beer is simply young/green, and the other flavors haven't come forward or blended with the alcohol flavors. That's not fusel, and if it's the case it WILL improve with time.
Kind of depends on your circumstances. You'd have to post more details for anyone to narrow it down.
Great response thank you.
Pitched with Wyeast 1056 (no starter). I've learned since then that with liquid yeast to make a starter. Ambient temp was 68-69 F but I don't have anything to control fermentation yet - it's at the top of my list.
I've got a second batch that was just bottled 4 days ago. I'm hoping that it's just a result of my first ever brew day.