Gig played on 16/7/06

Had Evan Dando not emerged in the shadow of Kurt Cobain, his resurrection of The Lemonheads might have been greeted with the same fervour displayed when Black Francis and Kim Deal made friends again. His songwriting savvy, his male-model looks, his gorgeous voice and all-round affability might have made him a pin-up in the pages of "Just Seventeen" but Kurt hogged all the kudos. Whatever the cost. So, when he and the two other men who now constitute The Lemonheads - an ever-evolving line-up, even at their height, with Dando the only constant - rolled into London last September to play "It's A Shame About Ray" from beginning to end, it was greeted with precious little fanfare and Evan was notably sullen on-stage.

Tonight at Somerset House he's hardly a stand-up but his sheer joy at being part of a band again - and one with all-new material due in late September - is palpable. There's a single concession to his solo album, "Baby I'm Bored", with what could have been his epitaph, "Why Do You Do This To Yourself?" ("You stayed awake for 14 days and then you slept a week. You drank out on the fire escape until you couldn't speak"), followed by the declaration that his one-man days are "over forever". Harder-sounding than ever, with a brilliantly wiggy-looking John Kent on drums and bassist Josh Lattanzi, The Lemonheads aren't so much 'back' this time as reborn.

"Ray" famously clocks in at under half-an-hour and the trio seem to be going for a similar speed record this evening, shoehorning 21 songs - old, new and covers - into a 75-minute set. The sun is setting as they take to the stage and as it disappears altogether, there's a giddy sense of watching a career-peak headliner at your own private Glastonbury-on- the-Thames. Songs from "Ray", "Come On Feel" and "Car Button Cloth" meld into one glorious best-of selection, with new song "Baby's Home" nestling in happily and boding well for the eponymous new LP, while favourite covers - Neil Young's "Powderfinger", The Misfits' "Skulls" and a glorious, heart-stopping romp through Mike Nesmith's "Different Drum" - get equally rapturous applause.

There's a troubling tendency for the new line-up to add rocky codas to the end of random songs (Evan even looks a little like "Spinal Tap"'s David St Hubbins with a fringe and Breton-stripe top) but after such a career-saving show they've surely earned the right for a little indulgence. Whether they're better than ever on record remains to be seen / heard but live, on a balmy evening in a perfect urban setting, they're truly as good as they ever were - sheer nirvana.

by Emma Morgan