Foals @ HMV Picture House, 31 Oct

Smoke machines work overtime while eerie cuts from Ozzy, Maiden and Tool’s Lateralus – a lingering nod to that ‘math-rock’ lineage – pour from the PA during Foals’ sound-check; it's a reassuring sign that the Oxford quintet aren’t too cool to indulge in the Halloween season with the zombies, Mario Brothers and Chilean miners in the front row. “Trick or treat?” offers frontman Yannis Philippakis. “It’ll be a treat from us tonight.”

Lending contrast to their set with the more expansive ambient turns from this year’s Total Life Forever, the ‘old ones’ are given room to breathe; it’s when the five floppy fringes gather centre stage to throw down synchronous turns at the rhythmically complex Olympic Airways, Cassius, or Electric Bloom that their synergy is at its height.

Delivering on that ‘treat’, drummer Jack Bevan returns for an encore in a gorilla mask, kicking off a three-song maelstrom by turning the classic Collins fill into The French Open. Closing with a sprawling rendition of Two Steps, Twice, Yannis – all about the PA climbing – takes to the venue’s balcony for a jam at 20ft. There's alchemy in the house alright, and the hope that Foals can keep on climbing. [Bob Morton]