Lau-Land @ Leith Theatre, Edinburgh, 18 Aug

Lau-Land begins with Lau as Kris Drever, Martin Green and Aidan O’Rourke position themselves around a solitary microphone and greet us with the dependably stirring Ghosts. Opening their own mini-festival is a considerate move that ensures a sizeable crowd awaits the tremendous array of talent they have assembled to perform alongside them at Leith Theatre tonight. Conversation from the bar slightly diminishes an otherwise beautiful introduction, until the curtain behind the trio falls to reveal a selection of considerably noisier instruments, which they quickly make formidable use of.

Hanging high above the stage and welcomed with a resounding cheer is a ‘WE LOVE THE NHS’ banner. A “sentient and temperamental” piece of electronic equipment introduced as ‘Morag’ also features, alongside a generous helping of new material due to be recorded with John Parish (PJ Harvey, Eels) later this year. Concluding with such triumph and intensity, it’s easy to forget that Lau are only the first act of the night, until members of the Whitburn Brass Band meander through the crowd, instruments in hand.

Assembling on the stage and floor of the venue, the Whitburn Brass Band deliver a thunderous rendition of Time for Outrage! Composed by Marco Pütz for human rights champion and concentration camp survivor Stéphane Hessel, it's a profoundly affecting and timely performance, particularly after Green’s prior quotation of Hessel: “If you want to be a real human being… you cannot tolerate things which put you to indignation, to outrage. You must stand up.”

Following rapturous applause, we funnel through corridors towards the Beasts of Trad room, where we find Brighde Chaimbeul playing the smallpipes. After two songs, Chaimbeul introduces Rona Lightfoot, whom she fatefully saw perform in Dublin at the age of four. A joyous performance from the two follows and showcases the potential of an event such as this in blending the contemporary and the traditional, ensuring that no matter who is in attendance, they are likely to see something unfamiliar and rewarding. Fortuitously, it's possible to catch every single act performing in the building tonight, with time to spare for the informal signing session afoot upstairs.

Brooklyn’s Joan as Police Woman signs records in the main hall for half-an-hour after her performance, which unfortunately feels a little too polished; missing the spark and intrigue found elsewhere in the building as Alasdair Roberts performs – his delivery is sharp, humorous and moving as ever – particularly on a new song, This Common Clay. Captivating a theatre with only a laptop and a microphone is often a difficult task, and better lighting and visuals would have benefitted Nadah El Shazly greatly. Some are lost in her hypnotic, avant-garde work, but many sadly just lose interest, and she performs to dramatically reduced numbers before the contagiously fun James Holden & The Animal Spirits arrive bearing synths and saxophones.

Chamber-folk quartet RANT delight a Beasts of Trad audience later, left breathless by Dublin’s Landless who sing cuts from their exquisite 2018 release Bleaching Bones in four-part harmony. While better use could’ve been made of the main theatre at times, Lau-Land is marvellously eclectic, refreshingly ambitious and frequently moving. A huge success.