With support from Leicester's Tired Irie and Oxford's Foals (risen from the ashes of the Edmund Fitzgerald), it's no surprise that the downstairs of the Zodiac is packed full. Despite falling into the math rock category, with intricate guitar melodies, Tired Irie boast a uniqueness born from semi-A Capella harmonies in most of their songs. This is contrasted with jolting, repetitive heavy and hesitant guitar parts. Even with the intoxication of Foals' main guitarist, their performance is wonderfully tight, with tunes and riffs to remember, more mellow than the Edmund Fitzgerald. Not only do their structured songs sound good, the live jamming session sounds as if they've worked on it for weeks.

From the beginning of their set, Youthmovies prove they haven't just been serving us drink at cafes and pubs around Oxford for the past year, In true math-rock style, each song has at least one time signature change, leaving head-bobbers unsure of how/when/where to move until the friendly and easy 4/4 time signature makes an appearance again. Playing little more than half a dozen songs, Youthmovies strike a satisfying balance between old and new material. The standout new song starts with all four members on guitar, guesting Sam and Rory (Mai Mayo Mai/And No Star) on trumpet and saxophone, playing beautifully tunefuly, sometimes jazz-like woodwind-math, layered with rolling bass lines and, from what i could depict, some pretty fuckin' emotional lyrics on top.

Although most songs tend to begin with soft guitar plucking, then climax into heavy chords with a few stop-starts and hand claps thrown in, Youthmovie Soundtrack Strategies never get boring and each song stands unique on its own.

The best Zodiac gig I've been to in the last six months. Pretentious song titles, 7 minute long songs, warped visual projections and friendly banter: what more could you want?