It’s not like me to review the same band twice in a row, but there is a reason behind my fangirling.

   “Are they still going?” was the question that followed almost every mention of going to see Jet. Almost as frequent was this exchange, recounted verbatim:

   “Who are Jet?”

   “You know, Are You Gonna Be My Girl?”

   “Oh yeah! God, are they still going?”

   My favourite remark came in the amused and slightly condescending dismissal of the band with, “Jet, haha brilliant! So retro!”

   Having learnt the back catalogue crash course-style in the week since rediscovering them at Portugal’s Optimus Alive festival, the week preceding their only UK date before disappearing back to Australia, I find these questions harder and harder to comprehend. Not least because Are You Gonna My Girl?, the song that propelled them into mainstream consciousness, has been far surpassed by their later musical output.

   I’ve speculated for longer than the dilemma probably warranted, but it remains a source of bafflement to me that Jet have managed to stray into obscurity in the UK, especially after the experience of seeing them live outside a festival setting.

   Opening with a snarling That’s All Lies, the tone of the gig was set. Retro it was, but in the best of ways. At the front amongst the pogoing the atmosphere was more reminiscent of a 70s punk gig, raw with aggression and resulting in much bruising from over-exciting jumping.

   The set list was nicely split between the three albums. Highlights included the monstrous Black Hearts (On Fire), seeing the venue’s crowd-surfing ban pushed to the max and frontman Nic Cester smouldering his way through the lyrics. La Di Da proved an unlikely touching singalong, and the outrageous tidal wave of riffs that is Start The Show was played ironically in the encore. 

   Nic played his part to perfection, swaggering with Godlike arrogance and his vocals alternating between a combustible growl and deranged screaming. His love for demanding a bit of audience participation apparently never gets old either, judging by Seventeen and Beat On Repeat.

   Meanwhile drummer Chris Cester, also on backing vocals, attacked his drum-kit with the intensity of an unhinged vigilante pulverising a floored mugger. The effect was too big for Shepherds Bush, and only served to reinforce the question of, why aren’t they bigger?

   Are You Gonna Be My Girl? inspired its expected spree of head banging and shouty-pointing from the crowd, and songs like Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is, Hey Kids, and Walk have choruses made for stadiums. Songs with less impact and similar appeal have achieved that in the past (Arctic Monkeys, anyone?), and with much less stage presence and charisma to back them up. So why not Jet?

   There are a few theories that carry weight. One, that they are Australian and therefore not taken inherently seriously by the rock ‘n’ roll aficionados governing UK airplay. Two, that Are You Gonna Be My Girl?, while so incredibly successful at making their name, with a tune that is played in introductions and adverts to this day, became their downfall in the eyes of the UK music Press. They ‘sold-out’, or became ‘too commercial’ or ‘mainstream’; all these words and phrases now so commonly used with fashionable distain.

   Whatever the explanation it’s a sad conundrum. Far from the gimmick that the UK’s knowledge of them makes them out to be, Jet are a fantastic and truly underrated rock ‘n’ roll band. Capable of far more than walls of noise and catchy riffs, their songs range from the grandiose to the gritty; wryly comical (“There is good and there is better/Just like imitation leather”, courtesy of Beat On Repeat), uplifting, raw, anthemic, intelligent, and simple, the best examples of which are sadly not given half of the credit they deserve.

   Come back soon, Jet. I do hope that one day we’ll be ready for you.   

Let’s get this straight. I am vehemently against new bands and prone to reading NME articles in WH Smith with a look of superior disgust on my face before walking home to a soundtrack of Oasis and David Bowie.

   However, once in a while, I stumble across someone who genuinely excites me, who can induce a strange Tourettes-like state whereby I recount the artist/band’s name plus a rambling stream of trivia at people I barely know.

   “Don’t you think Tom Clarke from The Enemy sounds like the love-child of Johnny Lydon and a young Paul Weller?”

   “That’s very nice, miss, but the newspaper is a pound…”

   You get the idea.

   So, Delphic. My first impression of them wasn’t the best, as the second support act before Kasabian at Myspace’s celebratory gig in Heaven, London. Their roadies took a monstrous hour and a half to set up their equipment, pushing Kasabian towards a 23:00 start that would cause me to miss my train. It wasn’t the band’s fault, but I was determined not to enjoy them. They could have come onstage dressed as Cuban revolutionaries on the shoulders of Joe Strummer and I still would have glared at them, silently, arms crossed across the barrier, and muttering about Kasabian all set. In much the same way that I wilfully ignore any band hyped by NME, I chose not to hear them.

   Fast-forward three months and a friend offered me a ticket to a gig of theirs not twenty minutes down the road. Pressured by her enthusiasm and the reasonable price I agreed and, with somewhat less enthusiasm, bought the album, Acolyte.

   It starts with Clarion Call. This opener, like the album itself, starts deceptively quiet before building into something so preposterously epic for a debut that it will have you jamming your head into the speakers, screaming, “More! Moooooore, I say!”

   There are echoes of New Order but no imitation, just pure electro-pop brilliance. Disregard the fact that one of the keyboard players looks like Gary Neville finding his true calling and focus on songs like This Momentary, that are almost hypnotic in their quality. Their vocalist and guitarist has a voice of appealing fragility, but capable of unexpected power, especially in Doubt and Submission.

   Doubt also demonstrates the simple intelligence of the lyrics. Without any of the clichés or laddish posturing that a lot of new bands succumb to, Doubt is a sincere and gentle attack of electro-beats and guitar.

   The real gem of the album however is the single, Halcyon. Halcyon is the sort of song with a chorus so catchy, so flawless, so painfully gorgeous, that I could be tempted to withdraw from society completely and sit, alone, ipod plugged into the wall with it on repeat for the rest of my life, rocking backwards and forwards with my hands over the earphones, salivating like a modern-day Gollum. When I heard Halcyon for the first time I forgot that other music existed for about three days, and it was only due to a technical fault and an accidental switch to Alabama 3 that I remembered, for the sake of my sanity and social appearance, that I would have to listen to other songs once in a while.

   Acolyte has managed to temporarily drag my cynical heart out of the 70s and, were it not for the narrow-minded attitude of Western civilisation, I would elope with one of its tracks and fulfil its every sexual need.

   I haven’t been to their gig yet, but I’m sure I’ll dance like a lunatic.

   Buy it. For the love of God, buy it.