If Oxford can be said to have an iconic music venue then it would undoubtedly be the Jericho Tavern in Walton Street. The beer-sticky room over the pub having paid host to many of the indie greats, the indie up-and-comers, and the indie flash-in-the-pans over the past thirty years or so.

And so it was there that Scottish folk experimentalists The Phantom Band kicked off their 46 date tour last night. Dressed appropriately in tartan shirts and chunky highland knitwear the six-piece crammed on to the small stage and without preamble launched straight into a full-on sonic assault that left no one in any doubt as to where their rock’n’roll sympathies lay.

To date they have released two critically acclaimed albums in Checkmate Savage and The Wants. Brought to the stage, the songs from both these records take on a new life, the electronics pulse with power and the hypnotic repetition of the guitar riffs are anchored by a throbbing low bass thrum and military style percussion that make for a thrilling and compulsive aural spectacle.

They are a probably a folk band, at least primarily. Lyrics about mountains, water, ships, and torchlight moons abound, but the background yelps and intonations and the electronics – one minute sounding like ambient sci-fi and the next like soundclips from a forgotten seventies Italian cannibal flick give everything an edge and an air of menace that is as compelling as it is unpredictable. This is not folktronica in the traditional sense (should there be such a thing yet) – much broader influences are at work from the motorik rhythms to the occasional psychedelic guitar squalls to the finger picked acoustics that accompanied the beautiful Come Away In The Dark. I was reminded at times of the criminally underrated Gravenhurst, or perhaps even a more muscular Wild Beasts – a Wild Beasts whose balls had dropped?

And highlights were many, from Folk Song Oblivion to Into The Corn by way of Left Hand Wave and Goodnight Arrow, tracks that had entranced on vinyl now crackled and spat or lulled and hypnotised and, on occasion, brilliantly combined everything together in a way the band described themselves as “playing a fast song and a slow song. At the same time.”

As the last notes bubbled and popped into the night air, The Phantom Band retired triumphant to sell merchandise and t-shirts with a picture of a cat doing ‘things’ to itself. With 45 dates to go, we reckon they’ll be coming to somewhere near you and you’d be a fool to miss it. You can check their full list of dates by clicking here.

Listen to a couple of stand out tracks to give yourself a flavour.

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Buy both albums from Amazon here.