Live: Homecoming. Crystal Fighters, Shepherd's Bush Empire.

Crystal Fighters may well have clocked up enough Airmiles and Frequent Flyer points on their travels to voyage once or twice around the world all over again, but tonight they're back in their concrete home, geographically dislocated from their spiritual origins in Navarra, the autonomous northern Spanish community on the fringes of their much-adduced País Vasco. Their Shepherd's Bush Empire showing thus serves as something of a homecoming, and assumes an air of welcome return, of the grand finale to the trio's globetrotting jaunt. Beneath early 20th century sepia façade queues curve towards doors flung wide open while within, the haunt's theatrical stage is lovingly cluttered with an array of instrumentation and Basque paraphernalia: suitably histrionic Marshall stacks snatched from The Darkness' stageshow clog up wings and gangways stage-left, consuming a vast billowing crystal that cowers in their shadows, while raggedy attabal and danbolin await percussive ravaging as they lie in awe of the monumental txalaparta at the heart of this lavish visual spectacular. The venue's three balconies lend an almost gladiatorial atmosphere, and they're all pretty much packed out. Come stagetime, anticipation is foreseeably rife: those on the floor shuffle and worm like tinned maggots awaiting fishing hook impalement; those gazing down from more vertiginous vantage points anxiously chew on nails and purr their preferred fragments from Star Of Love.

Finally a cloaked and unshaven druid-like figure emerges, ominously thumping a drum. Then, one by one, the electronic outfit emerge: guitarist Graham Dickson straps on a Les Paul, swiftly to be followed by the strapping figure of drummer Andrea Marongiu. Gilbert Vierich then comes to the forefront of the stage, arms flailing, to induce the sort of hysteria traditionally reserved for your average undiscerning pop apostle. Frontman Bast Pringle and backing vocalist Ellie Fletcher then emerge from opposing alleys, meeting in the middle where the tribalisms of the distortion-smeared Solar System have already been launched into orbit. The acoustic jolt of Follow and dubby thwack of Swallow, old acquaintances having been incarnated on opposite sides of the same seven inch a little over twelve months ago, are aptly aired back-to-back, while an especially obstreperous I Do This Everyday has scenes turn yet more turbulent, even the humanity on the balconies mangled together into singular masses of motion. I Love London, the track that gave the Crystal Fighters phenomenon its initial boot up the proverbial rump, in London, has always engendered delirium and tonight, with original vocalist Mimi Borelli on hand to girlishly hurl herself about to Pringle's right, this has conceivably never been more so. The processed winds of In The Summer, even in the context of a swiftly diminishing estival season, are breezier, more refreshing than ocean spray carried by typical Bestival weathers, however it's Plage that sends chills travelling from lower spine to upper neck as its vulnerable vocal refrains are lovingly devoured and regurgitated ad infinitum by nigh on all in attendance. The loving heart lyrical segments are even acted out wincingly by the odd couple dotted about. Billed as "the gal that started it all", Laure Stockley, the second of two original female voices within the group returns to holler a jubilant At Home. They later return for an encore comprised of their reinterpretation of a Spanish chantey and of course Xtatic Truth, although it's the comfort of this conclusion that seems convincingly befitting for their biggest headline show in the capital, a show that suggests they're capable of continuing to crank up the capacity, provided they return...