Sleater-Kinney @ Manchester Albert Hall, 24 March

This most potent of returns finally reaches the UK and manifests itself in a performance of extreme emotion: an experience that leaves both band and audience shattered and spent. Tellingly, Sleater-Kinney's 2015 fanbase is bolstered by a properly zealous youth brigade – too young to have caught them first time round, too savvy to pass on a second chance – and an absurdly rammed Albert Hall easily doubles their previous Manchester best.

An opening brace from comeback album No Cities to Love (Price Tag, Fangless) is a heart-stopping, jaw-dropping barrage but then they power into Oh!, the first of many smartly executed forays into their fulsome history, and it's like a bomb's gone off. The bouncing mass on the floor commits with blood-rush fervour: Words and Guitar; What's Mine is Yours; One Beat (a roar before Janet Weiss is out of the first bar); an unexpected, joyous Ironclad. Every song matters; no filler, no concessions, no hint of compromise. Two hot rocks from 1999's The Hot Rock – Get Up and Start Together – shine flawless and bright. 

Tonight they're so on it, you suspect they’ve actually been secretly practising together every week for years. As security passes water into the mosh pit, Carrie Brownstein high kicks and windmills, and the front row swoons. Corin Tucker is fearless. The voice properly, fully intact, she still sings – note perfect all night - like she's shaking off the devil. Sky Larkin's Katie Harkin, guesting for this tour, helps turn things up to 11.

An extended encore marries current (Gimme Love), iconic (I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone; Dig Me Out – carnage) and epic (a brutal Let's Call It Love.) They marvel at the response - an ovation for everything – seemingly baffled by the size of our love. But, really, they should know us better by now. There's more where that came from. Given half the chance.