IT ALL changed after the break. For the previous hour Goldfrapp had glided effortlessly through an often beautiful but perhaps slightly decorous set mostly dedicated to a Covid-delayed celebration of the 20th anniversary of their debut album Felt Mountain. Synths, guitar, percussion and a string quartet (provided by Q Strings who were a shivery pleasure) combined to wrap Alison Goldfrapp’s vocals in a hazy musical atmosphere that was one-part ethereal sci-fi background music and five parts soundtrack to the best sixties spy movie you’ve never seen.

But for the encore the strings disappeared and the band took us to the dancefloor (or as close as the seats in the Usher Hall allowed), with a muscular, throbbing march through the section of their back catalogue labelled “bangers”. Anymore from the album Silver Eye, Ride A White Horse from Goldfrapp’s imperial phase and, inevitably, Strict Machine were all given a shuddering, galvanic oomph that seemed extra thrilling after the show’s more controlled beginnings.

Suddenly the cool, even imperious, poses the band struck in the first half melted away and they started to look like they were having fun, with percussionist Seb Sternberg in particular grinning like the proverbial Cheshire Cat who had won a day trip to the dairy.

In many ways, last night’s gig spoke to Goldfrapp’s inbuilt binaries, beginning with Alison Goldfrapp’s voice which effortlessly pivots between sultry basslines and the high-soaring notes she reaches for (and reaches) when words alone won’t suffice.

Goldfrapp in the studio are a duo – Goldfrapp and Will Gregory – who lose Gregory but still grow legs in a live context. (Last night there were nine people on stage). Felt Mountain, which originally came out in 2000, set the standard for the duo’s love of widescreen, cinematic atmospheres, but they quickly followed it up with the glam stomp of Black Cherry and, of course, Supernature.

In the years since Goldfrapp have been toggling between these two default positions and it was notable that the achy, silvery drift of the first half of the evening, while Felt Mountain-heavy, could also accommodate tracks from Seventh Tree and Silver Eye which came out 17 years later (a gorgeous rendition of Moon in Your Mouth that served as a reminder of how underrated that album is).

And, it should be noted, that some of us turn to Goldfrapp for just that sense of hushed pleasure. So, last night’s show was a reminder of how capable Goldfrapp the band is in matching the sometimes eerie, sometimes cosseting sonic environments Gregory and Goldfrapp conjure up in the studio, most notably when tapping into Felt Mountain’s Weimar-goes-trip hop feel on Utopia and Lovely Head.

But sometimes you just want to dance. And last night allowed that too.

In short, Goldfapp remain singular in their duality.