Sigur Ros @ Alexandra Palace: 8/10

With their country melting down faster than an ice-cube in an Icelandic volcano, there was a certain poignance to Sigur Ros's appearance on stage at North London's Alexandra Palace last Thursday night.

They materialised on stage just after 9pm. Bashed out a track, before addressing the crowd in Icelandic. There were chuckles from the languid-looking, Viking-esque girls standing next to me. Perhaps Sigur Ros had just dissed the Brits for holding up their country's IMF loan? Perhaps I'll never know.

But words are kind of not the point when it comes to Iceland's aural diplomats. Their songs - mumbled to a level of incoherence that would leave Radiohead's Thom Yorke blushing - are not even sung in their native tongue. Instead, the genial foursome sing in their own-made up language, so haunting and spine-tingling, that it sounds like an extra instrument.

Unlike Radiohead, though, the Icelandic foursome isn't ashamed of its most popular tracks. They thrashed out Hoppipolla (used to death on the BBC's Planet Earth, and before that on Film4); the new album's opening track, Gobbledigook (where they brought their opening immitators on stage to bang their drums); and ending in a rousing rendition of E-Bow off the (-) almbum, bringing a tear to my eye and a feeling of such momentous joy that the come-down to reality never felt so depressing.