Gig review: The Temper Trap, ABC, Glasgow

THE Temper Trap just can’t help themselves. Whether starting from a position of gentle balladry or upbeat guitar-pop, their songs inevitably careen into loin-stirring, strobe-bathed anthemics.

It’s a sound that’s distinctly Australian in origin: both easy-going and at the same time revelling in a sense of bruised but stoic masculinity.

Oddly, however, Indonesia-born, Melbourne-raised, London-based singer Dougy Mandagi might have passed for a woman to any ill-informed audience members who found their vision fogged by the wash of flowering lights and artificial smoke hanging over the stage. His delicate falsetto is perhaps the best thing about his band’s sound – at its best it rang with the ghostly asexual tenderness of Antony Hegarty. Alongside the pop-anthemic proficiency of his four bandmates, it headed a rich and textured wash of sound.

Their imminent, eponymous second album was well-represented by the setlist, and new tracks including Need Your Love and the chiming mantra of I’m Gonna Wait sat well alongside earlier material like the powering extended main set finale Resurrection and the yearning, slow-build crescendo of Soldier On, which somehow hinted at the simple elegance of Modest Mouse.

Yet the audience’s cameraphone-brandishing reaction to the roiling guitars of finale and enduring big hit Sweet Disposition suggested their heartfelt if commercial style might not be enough to tip them over from one-hit wonders to an enduring, evolving stadium proposition.

Rating: ***