Breton @ BFI Southbank, London 11/01/13

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In the few short years since Breton emerged from the shell of a disused building in South East London brandishing a tough DIY aesthetic, a set of sharp, stop-start post-step tunes and a clutch of face-hiding hoodies, indie music in the UK has sadly grown ever more safe, middling and antiseptic.

In inverse correlation to this Breton’s Other Peoples’ Problems album was an intense, immensely tuneful series of jabs and uppercuts that struck the seams of jagged dance as ably as it pummeled the angled guitar lines of math-rock. While many bands towed the line, donned folksy waistcoats and strummed yet another jaunty tune about nothing, this set of vaguely troubling, slightly threatening artists and musicians set about marrying their film making past (frontman Roman’s work has featured regularly in the London and East End Short Film Festivals over the years) to their supercharged musical present.

Tonight’s show in the salubrious surrounds of the BFI’s main screening room is a small revelation for those seeking something of substance, style and intellect among the void of soundalike, lookalike bands that populate the pages of the music press today.

The 5 piece open big with the world premiere of album closer ‘The Commission’. Augmented by a string quartet the existentialist drama of the song itself is teased out and writ large on a screen that describes the destiny of a lone astronaut in both emotional and physical detail. It’s like watching the work of a slightly more accessible, council estate Tarkovsky – but with slamming tunes.

The brief social realist documentary ‘Decisive’ is another early highlight – it’s a delicate film that wraps itself in the arms of art while embracing the minutiae of the everyday. Suitably enough it’s accompanied minimally by slight, subtle strings and seeping samples. A version of their early single and ‘Red Road’ inspired video ‘December’ is transformed into a string-laden big screen adventure – warm oranges and browns contrast with the harsh realities of the alleyways and corners on which they are filmed.

The band itself are on peak form throughout – crystal clear sound allows them the luxury of being masters of the stage and they clearly enjoy it – occasionally standing back to admire the on-screen activity, sharing a beer, warmly thanking the appreciative crowd or, in the case of multi-instrumentalist Ian Patterson screaming into the microphone with a heartfelt last-note choke of emotion.

While ‘Pacemaker’ hints at where the band may be heading – it’s big budget, it’s beautiful and above all it really connects with the audience in the way great installation and video artists like Tony Oursler so often do – but again it has the benefit of being grounded in grim, half-savage sounds.

While the jerking joy of the anthemic ‘Edward The Confessor’ ripples nicely through the crowd accompanied by those infamous slow-mo portraits of raging, fist-clenched youngsters it’s left to the soaring LCD Soundsystem meets Mogwai glory of ‘Home Invasion’ to close the night with a Michael Haneke-like narrative short that treads a fine line between drama, horror and urban fairy tale.

In fact that’s as good a description as any other for this band – choosing to create art in a time of banality, opting out of the norm when there seems nowhere else to go – shining light on the darkness and illuminating the hope that can be found in the stultifying grey of modern life – they’re five Brothers Grimm, collecting the folklore of our era, scrawling their tales high on the silver screen, forcing them out into the world through shuddering, filthy, metallic speakers.

While the rest of the world slips into a middle of the road coma we should be grateful that there are still artists like this operating in the shadows, sending charges of electricity through its’ corpse, assured of individuality, projecting the world as they see it into the night.