Chemikal Underground @ ABC, 31 Jan

There is a warmth to be found in the busy ABC tonight which is not simply the cumulative effect of bodyheat. Chemikal Underground are 15 years old and are throwing a birthday party that reflects both the low-key approach of the label’s founders and the strength of the musical agenda they’ve allowed to flourish. Low-key perhaps, but solidly excellent and profoundly appreciated by the punters. Good will abounds.

Short sets from seven bands, all with albums out or on the way – no resting on past glories here, only a video screen, and a remarkably back-catalogued merch' stand carry traces of the last decade and a half - highlight the continuing relationship between this small label and Scotland's abundantly strong music scene.

Adrian Crowley takes the tough, early evening slot but his measured, introspection proves a stately send off before he makes way for the label's newest recruits, Zoey van Goey. Sweet, melodic and engagingly cheery, their indie-pop is light, airy and interesting enough to start the crowd moving stagewards. The Delgados' Paul Savage makes the first of his many appearances here, like a musical Jeeves, unobtrusively present and indisputably useful.

Formed from the embers of Aerogramme, this new, and eagerly anticpated, beginning for The Unwinding Hours, sparks well. The Final Hour has one of the most dramatic shifts from quiet to ooh-crikey-loud that the reviewer can remember. There appears to be a interesting reservoir of angst for the band to tap into, and they do.

Lord Cut-Glass is (another Delgado) Alun Woodward’s solo project in its full album ten-piece formation, complete with horns and strings. Woodward manages to combine both fizz and laconism while his band bounce. A joy.

Aidan Moffat & Bill Wells engross with simple material. A slightly odd, jazzy, trio with Moffat manning the traps, combines his trademark lyricism (masked with a tongue in cheek menace) with Wells' stately and simple chordal piano and a busy stand-up bass. “15 years?” mutters the grinning poet at one point. “It feels a lot fucking longer.”

As the clock rolls on, Emma Pollock's crunchy, passionate Tele-pop leaves us planning to check on the release date of her, soon to come, second album. On this brief evidence it appears that it will be a cracker. Finally, The Phantom Band are the spot-on choice to round the night off. With one extended riff that sounds like the Mighty Boosh’s Australian hallucination they are a definitively a groove. Then it's midnight.

A special night. We applaud, we go home happy. Hats off to messers Savage, Pollock, Woodward and Henderson. They've created something very special here which only arrives with good chemistry.