Gang of Four @ HMV Picture House, 18 Sep

As post-punk classics go, Entertainment! nestles beside Unknown Pleasures and Metal Box as one of the most exemplary and influential offerings from that genre's year zero. Since 1979, the funky, twitchy, paranoia that Gang of Four perfected on their debut album has proven perennially relevant. Thirty years hence, with only two fourths of the original line-up left, age has not tempered the anger of Natural’s Not In It or At Home He’s a Tourist. Maybe it's just a result of the technical problems that beset the performance tonight, but Andy Gill and Jon King look the frustrated part as they revisit the seminal work of their youth. The lone new song introduced during the encore is satisfyingly taut and wiry, though the dated new-wave dalliances plucked from Songs of the Free are less welcome. Nevertheless, spend an evening in their presence and the reverential namedropping feels something like justified.