Jeez, synths are in. Guitarists of Oxford: look on these works and despair. All three bands at tonight’s excellently-attended Black and White Promotions evening relied heavily on those eighties-tastic bloop factories to provide most of their instrumental interest, with the guitar relegated to acoustic rhythm duties during the headline act. And during the first two sets it wasn’t even doing that.

First up were electro-punk stalwarts Baby Gravy. They’ve evolved speedily since their days of chaotic, sax-heavy sixth-form rumpus-making, and are now a settled, disciplined four-piece. There are some things to like: Zahra Tehrani’s drumming is bouncy and characterful, and vocalist Iona spikily struts around the stage like a young Hazel O’Connor. Against that, her voice is on the average side, and no amount of attitude can compensate for the absence of a decent tune. There is still something unsatisfying about Baby Gravy: their brand of punk fails to embody unfettered aggression, but it’s not sophisticated enough to appeal to the artier types. The presence of rapper Mr Shaodow on one of the tunes seemed to raise the game of the band a notch. Maybe he should be a regular fixture?

Reading three-piece The Colours are much easier to sum up: if The Killers were fronted by Kelly from Stereophonics, they’d probably sound like this. Their use of a synthesizer rather than guitar is a smart move- without the keys they would be quality pub rock and nothing more. As it is, they sound like they could be in the van for the big 2009 synth-pop revival (love it or loathe it, it’s coming). Their big strength is their singer, who is very, very good, soaring effortlessly over those Van Halen (Jump-era, sorry!) keyboard lines. There is the odd discreet steal from the eighties mausoleum (I thought I heard a quote from Steve Winwood’s ‘Valerie’ at one point), but in the main they sounded, of the three bands tonight, most in tune with the predicted trends. Keep an eye out.

On to Alphabet Backwards, the indefatigably-jaunty five-piece currently adorning the cover of Nightshift magazine. The strengths of the group lie in singer James’ hook-laden vocal melodies, his ability to craft a belter of a chorus, and the baroque ingenuity of Rob Thomas’s synthesizer lines. If you add in a militantly-merry stage presence and well-drilled rhythm section, you can see why the band is doing so well. And yet….I can’t take them to my heart as yet. There’s a vacuity to the lyrics which annoys me (opening chorus is ‘There You Go’ repeated a hundredfold) and James’ admittedly strong tenor voice is oddly characterless. The songs seem everywhere and nowhere, about everything and nothing.

Still, the evening represented something of a triumph for the management of Black and White. Two strong local bands sandwiching a promising group from out of town, with the favour returned in the other participating cities. It’s a good formula and hopefully it will bring Oxford bands’ music to other parts of the south. Not a classic evening then, but like the music of Alphabet Backwards, the success of the night was trend-buckingly optimistic.