Waxahatchee + Swearin' @ Sound Control, Manchester, 25 October

It’s far too easy to compare Allison and Katie Crutchfield: twin sisters, talented songwriters, and former bandmates in PS Eliot and other DIY favourites. It doesn’t help that their two current projects are touring together. Allison fronts Swearin’ alongside Kyle Gilbride, pitting her damp-eyed powerpop against his hyper-melodic yelps, resulting in a smarter, fresher take on familiar pop-punk tropes. The fizzy freneticism of Crashing is a surefire winner, ditto Kenosha’s nagging, near-infuriating hook, and it all charges straight through a wall of glorious fuzz that blows both minds and eardrums. Somewhere between Superchunk and Kim Deal’s sorely-overlooked Amps, they’re a simultaneous rush of blood to the heart and the head, made all the more charming by bouts of mid-20s precociousness such as Movie Star’s frank sigh: “No-one likes you when you’re as old as we are.”

Katie, meanwhile, has a somewhat different take on that theme – “I don’t care if I’m too young to be unhappy,” she sings on Grass Stain, revelling in the melancholic sparseness of her Waxahatchee guise. Unlike the dense distortion of Swearin’, these songs feel almost skeletal in their arrangements, with every heart-melting line fully audible and utterly beautiful. Some songs are rearranged from the familiar Cerulean Salt recordings – in particular, the understated, breathy oohs of Swan Dive acquire an anthemic quality thanks to some nifty bolstering – but this helps to remind us that the songwriter behind them is still evolving; never settling when there’s still room to move forward. Truly captivating – the best kind of family affair. [Will Fitzpatrick]