It's a Friday evening, and the Albert Hall is tingling with a gone-straight-from-the-office-to-the-pub rowdy atmosphere.
But rather than walking in to a traditional gig set-up - you know, a drum kit and a few microphones on stage - we've all walked back into an office.
The Divine Comedy, fronted by Neil Hannon, are taking the title of their latest album very seriously. For the Office Politics tour, there's a desk, a huge suspended analogue clock, and a clunky PC monitor on stage.
It's part of an extensive tour for the Northern Irish orchestra pop group, now celebrating 30 years, who will head to Europe once they're finished with us Mancs.
Hannon wriggles onto the stage in a bright red suit and sunglasses, and promptly bumps his head on his own microphone. “Ouch,” he laughs, then says a polite hello while bouncing through Europop.
Generation Sex may sound whimsical and jolly and have toes in the venue tapping, but it's a song that perfectly demonstrates Hannon's cut-throat songwriting, with references to the greed of tabloids and the death of Princess Diana that still ring true 20 years later (the song was released just one year after her death and includes the lines: "Lovers watch their backs as hacks in macs take snaps through telephoto lenses, chase Mercedes-Benzes through the night. A mourning nation weeps and wails but keeps the sales of evil tabloids healthy. The poor protect the wealthy in this world.")
Norman and Norma is a delight, prompting polite chuckles at the witty lyrics between all the sing-songs.
A low point - and I mean, low enough that the queues at the bars and the toilet suddenly reform as if the gig hasn't stared at all - is The Synthesiser Service Centre Super Summer Sale, where Hannon talks to his own face on a computer screen and the song sounds entirely like it's been written and performed by Ross Geller from Friends. Even he knows it’s doomed to fail, leaving a long pause afterwards before muttering: “Well that’s that. Onwards!”
Things pick back up afterwards with Infernal Machines, a grumbling base line that could easily have come from the far heavier Muse.
For At The Indie Disco the band all don party hats and throw limp, small balloons out over our heads - it’s typically silly and unpretentious.
A Lady of A Certain Age shows that the slower tracks can really, really work, a laidback Mediterranean-coast-meets-arthouse-Disney-film single.
Obviously, National Express prompts a ridiculously lively response - “BA DA DA DA BAAA DA DA DA” we all bellow in the general direction of the band.
Hannon leaves Songs of Love until the encore and it's like an elastic band of anticipation finally snaps - known and loved as the theme tune for Father Ted, he gathers his band mates around one microphone as the audience laughs and sings along.
They stay in formation for Tonight We Fly but shouldn’t have – it’s too quiet, too flat for an encore.
Hannon’s stage presence is as much as it’s always been, his dry wit poking fun at himself, Manchester’s football rivalry and being the drunk ‘d***’ at the office party.
But his admirable efforts to create some sort of narrative throughout the performance don’t change the fact that it’s a disjointed setlist with far too much synthesiser experimentation. Maybe leave it to Ross Geller next time?
