Review: Maps & Atlases, Sneaky Pete's

Maps & Atlases are, according to the blogosphere consensus, a "math rock" outfit. Some of you might well have cause to recoil and drop this newspaper right about now, as a long-dormant terror revisits you in the guise of a hazy classroom flashback: the only context in which elbow-patch blazers, the pre-irony moustache and a chalk-riddled blackboard could coexist in (a very regimented) harmony.

Then there's the subject itself. Budding economists and statisticians apart, the perceived complexity can be daunting and off-putting, if numerical literacy figures are owt to go by.

While Maps & Atlases' early EPs - some of which are now out of print - were squarely concerned with shifting time signatures, counter rhythms and irregular song structures, their debut album of last year, Perch Patchwork, is a more inviting affair. On last night's showing, the Chicago quartet have not only added some gentler folk textures to their rhythm-centric songs, but there was something more intangible at play, too.

On several songs, guitars were neither strummed nor thrashed: a few lower jaws swung around the ankles as frontman Dave Davison kneaded his fretboard, cajoling his chipped and battered guitar across an hour-long assault course of string-snapping workouts. Allied to the 4/4 kick-drum thrust of Pigeon or the South American woodblocks of Witch was an intense sensuality that softened the edges of their formidable musicianship.

Maps & Atlases not only plough their own furrow, but they share stylistic elements with the current indie zeitgeist, especially their newer material which matches the sweeping majesty of Grizzly Bear, the spindly percussion of Battles, and even the rhythmic pep of Vampire Weekend.

Davison closed the band's debut Edinburgh gig with Solid Ground, before offering an acoustic encore that saw the band decamp on to the floor.

It would be trite to say that they delivered a masterclass. They're probably capable of even greater heights, though, as their name suggests, the possibilities for Maps & Atlases are endless.