Axis of Awesome: Won't Ever Not Stop Giving Up

Together for a decade, Axis of Awesome's onstage dynamic has shifted slightly in the last year after singer Jordan Raskopoulos came out as a transgender woman. A potentially tricky development to incorporate into their show, it's one the musical trio address immediately, if not explicitly, with opening number Elephant in the Room. Once dealt with, they can leave the issue to one side, though it re-emerges in guitarist Lee Naimo's cloddishly excessive support for his bandmate, a deft Schrödingers Cat gag and the reinvigoration of one of their best known numbers, Birdplane, the lyrics about a transitional state having acquired additional poignancy.

The group have always been adept at spoofing current musical trends and do so here with a track pastiching the over-earnest, supposed wisdom of youthful indie-pop, alongside updating the obligatory run-out of their hit '4 Chord Song' with some newer chart troublers. But as with keyboardist Benny Davis' imaginings of what would happen if Will Smith had maintained his habit of performing the theme tunes for his films, sometimes they're just daft for daft's sake, with a track about whistling to be happy is delightful in its botched delivery.

Naimo's irrepressible Johnny Cash impersonator, Jackie Change, is fine as far as he goes, which is not that far. And a song in which Davis' translates Raskopoulos' yearning declaration of love into increasingly frenzied German is predictable in its payoff. Still, it's great to see the Axis back and on form, reassuringly the same but different.