Against Me! @ Academy 2, Manchester, 7 Dec

Few bands could feasibly claim to provoke emotional investment quite as radically as Florida punks Against Me!. As frontwoman Laura Jane Grace leads her misfit collective through the title track from 2014’s Transgender Dysphoria Blues, it becomes clear how important Against Me! have become to the LGBT+ community – they provide as much of an opportunity for self-validation as they do for dancing.

Touring on the back of Shape Shift With Me, a scathing LP that finds Grace exploring the subtleties of gender identity and politics, it almost feels as though the band’s world tour is necessitated more by events in global politics than it is by new music. The cries of 'We can’t choose how we’re made' on the aforementioned title track are beyond visceral; they’re life-affirming. There’s a tangible sense of solidarity between band and crowd. Safe in the knowledge that nobody in the room voted for Donald Trump, the set is split into six songs from each of their two latest records, with a dozen older tracks bulking out the mammoth setlist.

Among the cathartic, town-crier-like venting that Against Me! shows largely consist of, there’s plenty of room for all-out punk fun. 'You make me wanna smoke cigarettes / You make me wanna drink whisky,' Grace smirks, as the spiky guitar lines of Unconditional Love cut through the room. Striking the balance between cathartic and fun is the issue that the Florida cult icons are tasked with each time they take to the stage to rattle through songs about gender, anarchism and identity. Tonight, there's a real sense that they strike that balance more effectively than any other band ever could.