Emerging from the tastefully edgy indie stable, Secretly Canadian, their third album, ‘Lost In The Dream’ exuded a self-assured krautrocky coolness the hipsters were hip to, while also boasting the stadium-ready vastness of classic American mainstream rock.

It shows tonight, with the greying heads of cogitating codgers a more prevalent sight than frenzied clusters of skinny-jeaned youths.

The NME had them down as ‘a Balearic Bruce Springsteen’  or ‘Don Henley on horseback’, so can I add to this alliterative metaphor-fest with (deep breath):
Dylan dolefully daydreaming of Dire Straits doing drugs in Dallas.

War On Drugs is basically the Adam Granduciel show; he’s the frontman, lead guitarist, songwriter and producer who’s surrounded himself with session dudes sympathetic to his quest for slackerdom supremacy.

They lock in for some heavy hypersonic grooving which, rather than heads-down, lank-haired shoegazing, would be more conducive to clear-skied, midwestern stargazing. While no doubt sprawled on the hood your ’69 Dodge Charger, hand in hand with your sweetheart.

Live, they deliver the same kind of languid thrills but with a sonorous surge that’s ever so subtly sonic.

A third of ‘Under The Pressure’s nine-minute length is given over to an open-ended ambient noise-scape but, neither live nor on record, does it ever seem to overstay its welcome. ‘Suffering’ boasts a beautifully soft, docile melody with a pin-sharp guitar solo and ‘Eyes To The Wind’, with its tumbling chord progression and potent axe-solo finale made for a rousing final song.

Several of their songs, such as the set-opening ’Burning’, ‘Red Eyes’ (a single with no real chorus) and the wonderfully pure ’An Ocean In Between The Waves’ have a pacy, attention-pricking tempo, yet they’re made doubly compulsive as they resonate in a vast, orotund swirl of sound that’s almost mantra-like.

In the same way that a distant air raid siren or a factory klaxon might cease being annoying after a while and adopt a more soothing, melodious quality, you get drawn in by the hugeness of their sound, succumbing until you’re woozy from the thrill.

The delicately-played melodies fuse beautifully with their collective merging of composite sounds; the metronomic bass lines, the plaintive wails of feedback and sheets of effect-heavy guitar sending waves of rhythmic noise rippling out to fill every corner of the room while the addition of a parping baritone saxophone on tracks like ‘Arms Like Boulders’ adds an extra layer of bowel-deep, burring bass underneath.

It seems likely that, Mark Kozelek aside, the only people not charmed by the simple joys ‘Lost In The Dream’ yields are those who are yet to hear it. Witnessing their beguiling live show simply confirms how special Granduciel and his gang are. Catch them touring the UK again in February 2015, as they’ll soon be playing venues as grand and colossal as they sound.