With the band seated on a low stage, playing acoustic instruments to an audience that couldn't see them, the Levellers's hometown return looked like an open invitation to that all too common species: the Brighton gig-talker.

Indeed, through much of the band's first set, the folk punks were battling against a hum of noise, as people chatted and tried to find high spots in the venue to see over the other audience member's heads.

Just before the end of the first set, frontman Mark Chadwick acknowledged there was a lot of nodding of heads and shuffling of feet among the audience, but not much dancing - something the band promised to rectify in the second half.

And they didn't disappoint.

The audience may have missed out seeing the usual Levellers live experience, with bassist Jeremy Cunningham sitting down rather than bouncing about the stage dreadlocks flying, but the music still had the ability to get everyone on their feet and lent itself well to the acoustic format.

The setlist ranged throughout the band's long history, taking songs from their first album, such as Carry Me and Barrel Of A Gun and classics like One Way and Far From Home, right up to recent single The Cholera Well.