Slough upstarts Brother have polarised opinion in their few months in the public eye. Self billed as the heirs to Oasis’s gobby, beer-swilling throne, they’ve been derided as a band trying to grab an audience that doesn’t exist any more. The legions of lads in the mid-1990s who bought FHM religiously and considered anything less than 15 pints a waste of a Friday night, have all supposedly grown up now and in their place is an audience craving a bit more subtlety.

But as soon as your critic enters the O2’s sweatbox of an upper room and heads straight for the bar we’re confronted with the results of Brother’s endeavours. Jostling for room on either side of us are groups of lads, all clad in short-sleeved check shirts and tattooed to the elbow. On the left, one set are demanding answers from one of their party, “that bird you pulled last night. Tell me you smashed it!” and on the other side, “Did you see that Charlie Adam tackle? F***ing disgraceful. Four lagers please mate.” Before a note’s even been played, you get the sense that Brother might be on to something here.

When the quartet eventually do get onstage and bang out their 40 minutes, things get suitably messy, with pints flying and arms aloft throughout. Musically, Brother call on a fairly predictable set of influences: there’s Oasis’s wall of guitars, the chirpy lyricism of Ray Davies after a night on the tiles and the baggy riffs of the Stone Roses, all chucked in together. Still Here, Darling Buds of May and the riotous New Year’s Day are all hurled out, each built round hooks that are subtle as fists to the lower jaw and the well-oiled crowd go bonkers for it. They won’t be on the shortlist for the Mercury Music Prize or invited to the Ivor Novellos, but Brother’s master plan of resurrecting lad rock certainly seems to be paying off.