Deerhoof @ The Caves, Edinburgh, 25 Jul

There’s something to be said for dependability. Thirty-one years in and touring off the back of last year’s predictably superb Noble and Godlike in Ruin, Deerhoof have reached the point that excellence is an assumption. It gets to the point where it almost becomes dull, what The Fall may well have been without the tension of an ever-changing lineup. But when you’re faced with them live, it really clicks how remarkable what they’ve done is. The fortitude to maintain their values (they were recently in the news after removing their music from Spotify over CEO and vampiric shitebag Daniel Ek’s ties to the arms industry) and commitment to consistently developing is kind of astonishing when it really sinks in, particularly opposed to say, milking your two years of being any good in an ever-intensifying nostalgia farming system. That is all to say Deerhoof are, as ever, very good tonight at The Caves.

In many ways it’s business as usual; songs equal parts chaotic and pure pop, jagged little tunes that stutter and fidget their way into being surprise earworms through Satomi Matsuzaki’s spritely, crystalline vocals, all broken up by drummer Greg Saunier’s 'Emo Phillips playing Igor'-style stage chat. There’s an enjoyable amount of string snapping and technical hiccups that their virtuosity has to battle against, and The Caves’ medieval acoustic has the strange effect of amplifying the glam stomp that sits underneath so much of Saunier’s sinuous drum patterns. It gives a new forcefulness to the intricacy that powers and defines the set, particularly on a cover of Silver Apples’ proto-synth pop masterpiece Oscillations that feels like being inside a wooden crate while it bounces through a thunderstorm.

But it’s the the guitar duo of John Dieterich and Ed Rodríguez that define the show. The twin guitar lines seem to spin in every possible direction, before slamming back together so hard it feels like they’re wrestling in a janky, elbowing cacophony tumbling about the stage. They’re the core of why Momentary Art of Soul! remains such a spectacle live. Essentially a tiny, initially irritating riff repeated to a maddening extent, it feels like a stuck record, but one that gradually melts and spring into flames in a wail of lightning guitar jabs; when it erupts it’s the gig’s rapturous height.

Deerhoof remain a magnificent entity with no signs of slowing up, even as they edge into their fourth decade as a band. One of the 21st century’s true greats.