For a band with so much going for them, Lanterns on the Lake cut surprisingly dour figures. With a raft of critical acclaim having floated their way following the release of their début album ‘Gracious Tide, Take Me Home’, you’d think that the Newcastle outfit might raise more than the slightest hint of a smile during their sold-out Lexington show.

Their lack of charisma matters not, however, as musically they’re nothing short of sublime. The muted crowd, seemingly silent through disinterest during the passable, gold jacketed post rock of support act Pattern Theory, are left in quiet awe by Lanterns singer Hazel Wilde’s bewitching vocals, which gradually and gloriously give way to swirling, shimmering, celestial crescendos courtesy of the multi-instrumental virtuosity of the band’s five remaining members. True to their frequently nautical lyrical content, the band’s songs ebb and flow beautifully, with the collective heartstrings of the crowd being pulled this way and that between the soaring highs and hushed, heartbreaking lows.

One of the band’s most obvious musical touchstones is Sigur Rós, and the sweeping strings, earth-moving guitar atmospherics (guitarist Paul Gregory indulges in some Jónsi-esque bowed guitar playing midway through) and light-of-touch electronics of set opener ‘Lungs Quicken’ wouldn’t sound out of place on the Icelanders’ sophomore effort ‘Ágætis byrjun’. ‘If I’ve Been Unkind’ shows the band’s folkier leanings, and later the eerie drone of ‘Ships in the Rain’, a ghostly ode to a fisherman lost at sea, injects heartfelt melancholia into proceedings.

Given how resoundingly sorrowful much of their output is, perhaps it’s not surprising that the band’s on-stage demeanour is similarly downbeat. When the music is this achingly beautiful, charisma doesn’t even come into it.

Francis Whittaker