The blistering night of music saw four diverse acts from Glasgow, Wales, New York and Detroit thrown together to create a cocktail of passion, energy, punk, disco and rock.

Kicking things off with their floppy fringes and cool attitudes were Franz Ferdinand. The neat, jolty guitars, short sharp drums and singalong choruses were perfect to get us warmed up.

Franz Ferdinand

Their old fashioned drum set up is reminiscent of The Jam with no toms and gives their sound a 'Mod' edge. They clearly love playing live and looked like they were having the time of their lives.

The sassy, stomping Take Me Out goes down a treat with the crowd who'd only just got the chance to break into a sweat before the lads say their goodbyes.

Next up were The Von Bondies from Detroit - frontman Jason Stollsteimer takes centre stage, sandwiched between cool guitarist Marcie Bolen and bassist Carrie Smith.

The Von Bondie's Marcie

The four-piece seemed to be driven by Carrie's 70's rock bass lines tonight which had a Doors/Deep Purple feel. It's not long before their sheer energy has feet moving and arms and legs pass by as the crowd surfing gets underway.

They bring things to a frenzy with the rip-snorting, aggressive C'mon, C'mon which the crowd holler along to.

Changing gear slightly, we move on to The Rapture from New York who come on all guns blazing and start off with a rockin' punked-up Love Is All.

Once we're warmed up, the sequencer and Roland keyboards were wheeled on and we moved on to more of a rave scene with the disco funk of Sister Saviour.

The Rapture

This band are not afraid to boogie. Once into the disco vibe they un-coil their energy and get down with some pointy finger dancing - I'm sure I even saw bass player Mattie Safer doing the funky chicken at one point.

These guys are a fresh, punked up version of The Happy Monday's - they would be a great festival band and even have their own 'Bez' in the shape of percussionist Gabe Andruzzi.

As they leave the stage a chant of "Bring On The Funeral" from the devoted FFAF fans began and we prepared ourselves for some Welsh nu-metal from Funeral For A Friend.

The five-piece were on ferocious form, with singer Matt Davies swinging his mic without seeming to care or notice that it was smacking the floor as it spun round.

Funeral For A Friend

It soon became clear that it's not just Matt singing - he's joined by drummer Ryan Richards who's not only a dab hand at the tubs but can also belt out the deepest, roughest vocals a la Raging Speedhorn at the same time.

The mosh pit is a clambering sea of arms and legs as Matt convulses and belts out the raw gutsy vocals despite having a dose of the flu. At one point he has to blow his nose and offers the results to the crow. A sea of eager hands reach out for the snot-filled tissue which he seems to find quite alarming.

Escape Artists Never Die was an explosive, belter of a stand out tune for me and the huge circle pit organised by Matt went down a treat with the crowd.

The Welsh rockers are living proof that there's more to Wales' music scene than Tom Jones and male voice choirs! It's refreshing to see a British nu-metal band giving the Americans a run for their money.

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