I’m loath to tar The Brakes with the ‘supergroup’ label; I mean they’re hardly Crosby, Stills and Nash. Or Young - though they’d probably love to be the latter.

Nevertheless, they are a platform for members of three of Brighton’s finest and most indie of bands (British Sea Power, The Electric Soft Parade and The Tenderfoot) to get together and knock out a few tunes in a somewhat jokey, lo-fi, garage rock, country punk style.

...it turns out that they’re an ideal band for those afflicted with Attention Deficit Disorder

Spotting the setlist pinned to the amp, I’m at first a mite concerned. Threatening to spill over onto two sides of A4, it looks like we could be here for a long evening - It’s 10 o’clock by the time they emerge. But no, it turns out that they’re an ideal band for those afflicted with Attention Deficit Disorder.

“This was our first single, ‘Pick Up the Phone’", announces BSP keyboardist Eamon Hamilton, who’s stepped up to guitar and vocals for the evening. Was it? My concentration lapsed, so I missed it. So they play it again. And as it’s only about 25 seconds of guitar and practically only a single line of dialogue there’s plenty of time to fit in an impromptu repeat.

But they’re not all that short. Some are less than 10 seconds long.

A difficult act to pin down, The Brakes slip and slide from one genre to another. One minute they’re gorgeously covering Johnny Cash's 'Jackson' all of a twee indie strum; the next they’re belting out some scrappy, indie, shouty thing about not being able to hear the Tenderfoot play at the Freebutt as some fan insists on shouting in Hamilton’s ear.

The only consistency seems to be Hamilton’s strangely affected Hicksville southern drawl and their playful, almost cocky approach to playing.

The only consistency seems to be Hamilton’s strangely affected Hicksville southern drawl and their playful, almost cocky approach to playing. It’s slightly frustrating that the covers generally surpass their own material. A sublime cover of The Jesus and Mary Chain's 'Sometimes Always' with two of three Pipettes on backing vocals follows an excellent, synthy 'All Night Disco Party'. And then there’s more knock-off, 25-second, throwaway stuff like 'Cheney' (complete lyric: "Cheney, Cheney, Cheney. Stop being such a Dick"). And then they’ll make a show of introducing a cornet player, only for him to tootle two notes and depart.

They’re clearly having a great time away from their day jobs. They shouldn’t give them up though.