Listening to the Bookhouse Boys is a bit like living inside a hip, modern western. On the other side of the camera Tarantino or Rodriguez may be calling the shots, but over here vampire girls are dancing tables at the truckstop while sad-eyed mariachi hide guns in their guitar cases.

Retro cool is a narrow line to walk – one misstep and you’re knee-deep in pastiche – but the Bookhouse Boys don’t put a foot wrong. Fronted by a boy-girl vocal combo of Paul Van Oestren and Catherine Turner, the nine strong group’s throbbing surf guitar mixes with Latino trumpet flourishes, heavy drum action and Spaghetti Western oohs to great effect. Songs such as ‘Dead’ and ‘Tonight’ sound pretty damn good coming through my headphones on the Tube, but when played live they seize hold of the old frontal cortex and demand – demand, sir – to be heard.

Anyone who was swept away by the Bookhouse Boys’ debut album last year (and there sure seem to be a lot of you out there) really should get along to a gig; the band’s widescreen, cinematic sound combined with Van Oestren’s molasses tones to fill every last nook and cranny of Hoxton Bar.

Slightly perversely, then, one of my favourite songs of the evening was new tune ‘Oh Lord’, which laid the mariachi noodling to one side in favour of a simpler, stripped down gospel sound – I was reminded of St. Jude’s Infirmary’s rather wonderful ‘The Church of John Coltrane’. There’s a tendency among indie music fans to shun bands once great unwashed begin to take an interest and I can see the Bookhouse Boys taking off, so enjoy them to the max while you can. Who knew Dick Dale and Deadwood would get along so well?