What you sea is what you get

Ocean Colour Scene | Brixton Academy, London

During their rapid rise to prominence, Oasis were often supported by the washed-up Ocean Colour Scene, leading the cynical to suggest the latter had been chosen to make the headline act look better - that traditional if rarely admitted trick. Certainly, OCS must have become used to playing to larger crowds, albeit crowds of people with their backs to them.

During their rapid rise to prominence, Oasis were often supported by the washed-up Ocean Colour Scene, leading the cynical to suggest the latter had been chosen to make the headline act look better - that traditional if rarely admitted trick. Certainly, OCS must have become used to playing to larger crowds, albeit crowds of people with their backs to them.

Yet such persistence paid off, and their "Riverboat Song" achieved the dubious double of catapulting them to fame and, as walk-on music on the late, unlamented TFI Friday. Their 1996 Moseley Shoals album shifted a million and thrust them into the big league; they were outselling their inspiration Paul Weller and quietly becoming, as they have remained, Britain's biggest uncool band.

But OCS obviously delight their loyal following. Brixton Academy, a sizeable venue, is packed with males of all ages, many holding two pints of lager. They love every second, even the weak, sub-Roger Daltrey ballads such as "In My Field" and "Biggest Thing", from the forthcoming Mechanical Wonder. All around, people are singing along, spilling beer in their haste to thrust their hands into the air, and proving that OCS play a rare form of music that men are allowed to hug one another to.

Those unconverted to this not especially broad church can only wonder what golden moments the well-constructed if unmemorable tunes evoke. That first sales target achieved? The award of a company car boasting a CD player? Judging by the fanatical response to the hopelessly literal "The Day We Caught the Train", OCS are hitting a chord with Middle England that others would be advised to emulate. What next? Free CDs with the Daily Mail?

Despite their worthlessness to outsiders, they at least give the audience just what they want. Half of the set must have consisted of singles, such as the "You've Got It Bad", "The Circle" and the current "Up on the Downside", a bland soft-rocker that makes Toploader sound like the Aphex Twin.

Yet their sheer naffness is inescapable. The lead singer, Simon Fowler, presumably a millionaire, makes the error of dedicating a song to a hostile critic, while a galumph through the Small Faces' "Son of a Baker" just shows up the gulf between that drug-crazed gang of Cockneys and these prosaic thirtysomethings devoid of magic, recreating a youth they never enjoyed. OCS are a definitive lifestyle band, their sound suiting that of their constituency, which in turn subsidises theirs. For neutrals, they're about as engrossing as an angling competition, perhaps for carp.