Ok, so they may have won the Mercury Music Prize, but can Gomez deliver a thunderingly good hoedown and really raise the barn roof?

Yesiree-bob. And last night's gig at the Olympia had the panel of punters jumping up and down like hillbillies on hooch.

When they formed in 1996, Gomez couldn't even get themselves arrested, but since they've snagged the prestigious music award, everybody's hollering about these hot young critters from Stockport in England.

Live, Gomez come on like country troubadours on a pilgrimage to Gram Parsons's grave, and as the twenty-something whippersnappers jammed out on yet another country-psychedelic groove, you'd almost swear the boys had played Woodstock in a previous incarnation.

The sound is so firmly retro, it could sit comfortably alongside Creedence Clearwater Revival or Country Joe & the Fish, if it wasn't for the sudden bursts of distorted electronica or the odd trip-hop breakbeat.

Old heads on young shoulders? You better believe it, especially when singer and slide guitarist, Ben Ottewell, cranks up that tree-chopping voice of his.

Ottewell shares vocal duties with guitarists Tom Gray and Ian Ball, and together they whip up a dust-trail of tunes, sometimes sounding like Pink Floyd on the dark side of the prairie, other times reminding you of The Verve in cowboy boots.

The breezy balladry of Tijuana Lady dips dangerously into Eagles territory, then slides majestically into a crackling psychedelic coda before settling into the extended country-soul of Blue Moon Rising.

Even before they bagged that most intellectual of pop awards, Gomez had already drawn a sizeable Dublin crowd for their summer gig in the Temple Bar Music Centre, and the fans in the Olympia were already familiar with the band's maverick good-time style.

They may give off an air of slacker nonchalance, especially when singing Happy Birthday to drummer Olly Peacock or doing a passable impression of The Wurzels on E, but when they grind into the sawdust riffs of Get Miles and Whippin' Piccadilly, then Gomez really get the sparks flying and the feet stomping.