Marseille Figs, South London Pacific

The South London Pacific has worked as hard as an Amsterdam coffee shop to create a kitsch and retro-hip environment for its youngish clientele. There are papier-mache primitive sculptures everywhere, and the intimate interior is lit as if by the glow from a wood fire. Amanda, the evening's vaudevillian host, informs us that the support band is two Polish guys she's just met on the street. They do a spirited version of the banjo duel from "Deliverance" before being summarily dismissed to make way for the Figs - perhaps we are running late having spent an unnecessary half-hour in the company of Bob the Mindreader.

The Marseille Figs, who have journeyed from Berlin, Barcelona and Hackney to play for us tonight, tear straight into "Me and My Monkey" which, despite the fact that they're a three-piece, manages to sound like a rock epic.

The band are an intriguing mix of very old-school skiffle, bluegrass and jazz, with slightly less old-school post-punk. They change instruments with every song, drawing on sax, melodica, flugel horn, accordion, and so on. But most gratifying is the way they create vibrant, driven music without a drummer or drum machine marking out time in the background. Instead, each song is pushed along by a vigorously strummed acoustic guitar or intricately plucked ukulele, and fleshed out by battered brass, wheezing accordion or the cheapest of children's Casio keyboards.

A different approach to live music is always welcome, and an escape from the decades-old dictates of electric guitar and bass - and drums, especially so.

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