Liverpool's Bluecoat arts centre has been around since the dawn of time, but after a recent refurbishment, it now boasts a brand-new performance space that is rapidly establishing itself as a centre of edgy music in the city. However, due to the fact that your DiS correspondent operates on shitty gig venue time and not plush arts centre time, we miss a big chunk of support act Hot Club de Paris’ first set in Liverpool for some time. Bugger.

Still, we catch a few songs. Hot Club are their usual laconic selves, full of quips and banter, but every time we see them play they seem tighter, slicker, less erratic. The band have often labelled 'kooky' and 'wacky' due to their use of humour and odd time signatures, but tunes like 'Names and Names and Names' have stayed the course, and with familiarity, the quality songwriting at the core of everything they do shines through. The new songs they debut also show a leaning towards a sharper edge, but without forgetting the unique characteristics that got them noticed in the first place.

But it's Clinic that are tonight's rare treat. Despite the fact that, for over the last ten years, they have remained one of the most critically-acclaimed bands to come out of Liverpool, received a Grammy nomination, played with The Flaming Lips, Radiohead and Arcade Fire, the four-piece remain little known in their home town.

Walking on stage, Clinic may be older, but they still wear the surgical masks that marked them out when they released their debut ‘IPC Subeditors Dictate Our Youth’ back in 1997. Frontman Ade Blackburn announces that their gig will be split into two sets. The first, a collection of tunes from upcoming new album Do It and the second a collection of songs from their now extensive back catalogue.

They begin, and from behind the masks and their bright Hawaiian shirts, weather-worn hands work to create the low, smoky, chugging groove that is Clinic's trademark. Their music has a weird, almost psychedelic feel, but with something of a new wave edginess, there's a hint of a Talking Heads jerk and a Fall lyric in the mix.

On record, the individual characteristics of each twisted little song seep out from between the complex mesh of warped organs and fuzzing guitar. Live though, Clinic are harder to penetrate. You can identify tunes like 'Corpus Christie' but the sounds they produce are less songs, more like intense and constantly shifting variations on a theme. Essentially a series of moods played out over a constant, tickling groove.

With that groove, Clinic take the willing deep into their world. And it's a satisfying world to look into, if a little uncanny. In it we find a bunch of men who've been down a hole for a long time, with only one squinting eye looking through a narrow knot to the wider world, their voices restrained, their only method of communication a motley collection of vintage instruments glued to their fingers.

At its best, watching Clinic is like being stuck in the opening sequence of a 1970s kids cartoon made by a bunch of pot-smoking art students who'd somehow managed to convince the BBC to give them a wad of cash. At worst, it's like watching a bunch of old fellahs widdling in the corner of a well-ploughed field, trudging through numerous deep ruts filled with stagnant, insect-covered water.

As they end on 'Family' , we are left high but a little ambiguous. Are Clinic one-trick ponies with a neat weird sound, or one of the most original and maverick acts around who will continue to quietly punt their unique groove to fans across the globe? Which side you fall on that we reckon, all depends on whether or not you believe that IPC subeditors do indeed dictate our youth.

Photo: Sakura