Fly By Night's successful and sell-out Anti Valentine gig, three days after the event, was a platform for the launch of opening act The Big Apple Credits' new six track EP. Meeting their rising acclaim head on, with their body-pounding, attitude-laden blues rock, TBAC gave their best ever performance.

Despite their retro influences, they sounded fresh - full of frothing enthusiasm and unbridled joy; every note accompanied by giddy euphoria, as frontman Jonny revealed his inner Robert Plant and guitarist Max's riffs ricocheted around the room.

Just Jerry kept the momentum and the mosh-bounce going with their zingy collisions of skittering ska rhythms and bratty punk, proving the two most exciting bands of the night for the crowd.

The thumpingly infectious Canny seems fated to provide the changeover filler. This was a misuse of the talented beat-boxer; he desperately deserves an artistic slot in the spotlight in his own right, as opposed to being just the pop-up novelty act.

Beaming down from planet punk, 'best live act Lipstick Award winner' for last year, Dogzuki, were as hyperactively ferocious and challenging as ever. But, although they still managed to deliver the goods, they almost misfired when a disjointed performance and tedious bantering between songs (that had much to do with bassist Steve's tired and emotional state) only served to sabotage their set and render them less potent than usual, in spite of the best efforts of guest singer Al (One Room Down) in orchestrating a stage invasion. Dogzuki just about got away with it. But only just.

Milford metal malcontents, Darken The Sun, were unlikely headliners for the Queens Hall and, it seemed, for many of the audience.

Their tightly executed and lacerating extreme metal, buffed to an awesome unpleasantness, was electrifying, subversive and utterly deranged.

The audience had to mine for melody using finely tuned titanium-tipped antennae. It was like trying to keep your balance in a hurricane, under singer Simon's taunting, blowtorched sneer; sonic lobotomy wrapped in short-tempered finesse. Darken The Sun, then: a very dark and very distinctive Milford pleasure.

MOLL