Courtney Barnett @ Gorilla, 3 April

“We had the best meal of the tour so far.” That nugget of between-song stage chatter isn’t the only way in which Courtney Barnett flags up what a peculiar little venue Gorilla is; while the restaurant facing out onto Whitworth Street West is becoming increasingly bourgeois, the venue in the back – under the railway arch, stage wall lined with old electronics – feels ever more like a good old-fashioned rock club, especially tonight.

Taking the stage in front of a white sheet that’s wrapped around in such a fashion that they almost appear to be playing inside a tent, Barnett and her bare-bones band – just a drummer and bass player for backing – take a decidedly no-nonsense approach to her debut record, Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit, which charted at a respectable number 16 last week. Pedestrian at Best and Elevator Operator are suitably abrasive, early cut History Eraser zips past at breakneck pace, and even the usually subdued Depreston seems to take on a touch more aggression live. The great triumph of Barnett’s recorded work to date is the razor-sharp wit that permeates her lyrics, but live, it’s the ramshackle, rough-around-the-edges nature of the compositions that comes to the fore, and the results are thrilling.