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Simone White, Peter Von Poehl, The Lodger, The School, Chiara L's, Voltaires The Art of Kissing at The Faversham, Leeds

Voltaires are the kind of noisy cliche that I worried would mark The Art of Kissing - a night in Leeds pub The Faversham and while they have their charms they lack a little originality. Guitars grinding and guys singing and they are rewarded for their efforts by applause but Leeds - as opposed to the other four centres of population in West Yorkshire - seems to produce a formula for bands and Voltaires are very much of it.

The Chiara L's are from a similar template. Musically they are strong with a powerful drum and bass pushing lively guitar but lead singer/keyboardist Chiara lacks the stage presence to make the band stand out. She hops and jigs on stage and at one point seems to engage in performance origami all of which screams "quirky" and serves to underline her slightness on stage. She wears the dress of a sparkling front woman but no one is at home.

The band are plagued by technical problems not of their own making and before the next band arrive an amp is replaced which is a shame because behind the girl is an interesting sound which is over-ruffled tonight. Up front though they seem - once again - to lack originality

Having loads of people on stage and coming from Cardiff is anything other than original these days and The School share an almost identical set up to the previous band save the addition of a xylophone glockenspielist who looks as if he has been dragged from a building site and is none too pleased about it but the breezy brand of annunciated vocals and tweed up backing is more disarming.

They wear their influences well - The School being the suffix of a Belle and Sebastian song which has obviously been digested by the band - and they bring something fresher to the mix. All I Wanna Do sounds like Dusty Springfield fronting The Divine Comedy while Valentine sounds like it could be pulled from a lost Camera Obscura album that had slipped back in time to the 1960s.

The band are invaded on stage by five friends who join the band in high hand clapping and despite the fact one looks as if he is about to swing his pants the whole stunt appears charming. Strains of Steph's violin drive Let It Slip and tweecore finds a breathy Sarah Cracknell. They are selling singles on pink vinyl after the show and that fits rather well. If you do not tap your feet to The School then you probably don't have any.

The Lodger do not need to find their feet and tonight play a set of two old and five or so new and brilliant songs including new single and perhaps best work so far The Good Old Days which marks a real advancement in Ben Siddall's song writing hanging the melody off a palmful of chords and if you buy into the idea that this band really are the new Smiths then this is their How Soon Is Now?.

All of which comes at the end of a set which sees them augmented with an extra guitarist who adds a breadth but not a weight to the sound and they still sound crisp and picked out of the best of pop music. The band have just finished new album Life Is Sweet which improves on the excellence of Grown Ups. A Hero's Welcome lyrically plays with themes of isolation - "You could be waiting for this bus forever/waiting for the fun to begin" evokes Manchester's finest while being up to date.

The Lodger are the sound of waiting for a mobile phone to bleep with a text that never comes. How this City adores The Pigeon Detectives and Kaiser Chiefs over this band amazes me.

After such excellence Peter Von Poehl - a single, tall, hairy Swede - has a tough time impressing. He is the next in an increasingly long line of Swede solo artists and he is more Jose Gonzalez than he is Jen Lekman but eventually he wins me over with a cover of Heartbreak Hotel that omits the word lonely in favour of a guitar break - Elvis would be impressed - and if his songs do not have enough of an honestly to them then his performance certainly does with his neck snapping up right to sing high notes.

Von Poehl will live longer in the memory than Simone White who’s acoustic stylings are lost in the late night hub-bub of the pub at ten thirty and one is forced to wonder who put the two solo acoustic performers on last?

No matter. These all day events peak between eight and nine and that is when The School and later The Lodger shone.

Los Campesinos!, The Luvvers, UltCult BD1 Live at St George's Hall, Bradford

After blazing through Broken Heartbeats Sound Like Breakbeats the band introduce themselves. "We are Los Campesinos! and we are from Cardiff, which is near Bristol."

It is the type of comment which typifies the seven strong popster from South Wales and one is not sure if it is a flippant quip or a heartfelt claim on the heritage of that City.

UltCult look young enough to not have been at school when Sarah 100 came out but they resonate with the same DIY spiked joy that bands like Talulah Gosh, Even As We Speak and The Sea Urchins used to put through the Bristol record label with a sly mix of Kevin Shields edged on.

They are three girls, two guys and small glockenspiel - glockenspiels are the instrument de jour tonight - and they sound like the fastest relationships one could have started and ended in a single night.

Odious Emporium opens the set and is impressive. Five Bedrooms and Two Lounges closes and stands out and what passes in-between is far from dull. They depart to impressed noises.

Noises describes The Luvvers who are a musically tight four piece of lads - the very sort that will later be described as "saying nothing [to me] about [my] life" and they are fronted by a bleached blonde haircut who seems to ape style and lack substance.

Substances concern Los Campesinos! and Gareth Campesinos jokes that they are on crack but the band are more like the sound of a bunch of teenagers on sugar rush. They are a band to fall in love with mixing smartness - smugness even - of lyrics with an excess of energy in performance and ring in an ill fitted innocence that gives them charm. They credit Blank Generation's Adam Simons with giving them a first gig outside either capital and are genuine in doing so. "We would have had to get proper jobs..." Gareth comments.

This ebullient charm runs through the night. Drop It Doe Eyes - sung by Aleksandra Campesinos who swaps from side keyboard duties to the front - is a joy and the Pavement cover Frontwards sounds superb. Harriet Campesinos - see what they have done with the names? - draws a bow over her violin creating depth to what would be a sound of kids hitting tin and looking over the instrumentation the seven have one can see where the Arcade Fire comparisons come in. Had Arcade Fire gown up in Cardiff and listened to Heavenly they probably would sound like this.

Gareth retreats to the back of the stage and joins Ollie Campesinos drumming the famed start of You! Me! Dancing! and they go from good to great with the half full St George's Hall moving with a total joyous lack of unison. They finish on Sweet Dreams, Sweet Cheeks after stand out version of We Throw Parties, You Throw Knives which exceeds the album and sees Gareth bounding around the stage. They are a band who are going interesting places and owe much of that to the start and support they got in Bradford.

Tonight they repaid us.

The Ending Of, Dinosaur Pile-up, Getoutofcities, Bedroom Gymnastics Granadaland at The Love Apple, Bradford

Bedroom Gymnastics

They are young - these Bedroom Gymnastics kids - and in a while the keyboard Katie will be told that she has to go home by her Dad when on stage she is apart from the rest of the band of pale faced yoofs who are warming up the Bradford scene.

They are well supported by old and young and thrash away on guitars through songs like Holes - the oft talked about track- but they have a tendency to bleed one bit of thrashed guitar with howling vocals into another bit of thrashed guitar with howling vocals and one is taken not with a confidence but the opposite.

In a quieter moment they cover that Lisa Loeb song that everyone can hum but no one knows the name of and give themselves away. They can play and they can sing but they lack assurance in their abilities to do so and hide themselves behind the howls.

Getoutofcities

Howls are one of many noises that will not be heard after the volume excesses of Getoutofcities who are dubbed Post-Rock and after an eardrum splitting set should inspire a joke about posts and deafness but none spring to mind. They are proponents of that swirling, atmospheric, soundtrack music and are entertaining enough but fail to rise above the likes of Falconetti or Lab Noise in Bradford's crowded aural soundscapers.

Dinosaur Pile-up

Immediately rising as high as some demented Pterodactyl are Dinosaur Pile-up who rip through a five song set in their third gig brilliantly. From Kendal via Leeds they pilfer the sounds of early 1990s smart American guitar rock - if you think Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain is three times as good as Nevermind then Dinosaur Pile Up are for you - while bringing a sense of modernity to proceedings.

They crunch through My Rock n' Roll and it digs into the head with a powerful bass line thudded out by checked shirt wearing Tom (as distinct to the other Tom sterlingly performing on drums) while lead guitar/vocals Matt fuzzes up both strings and singing to an increasingly appreciative audience. I Get My Direction's loud-quiet-loud approach has the word "Pixies" thrown about in a good way. Matt hopes to have twelve songs done towards the end of the summer and will test them as the three piece tour extensively - "I've just got a van" he says - which could be the making of the band and certainly will give plenty of opportunity to see them again.

Not that keen to be seen again are The Ending Of who grind through a dull set never becoming more interesting than when the guitarist strays too far from his fuzzbox and pulls the wire out. They tell us they have never been to Barnsley before and that seems forced. The set is cut short and time - mercifully - plays a part.

Ear drums recovering then the talk of of Dinosaur Pile-up who go on to support The Rosie Taylor Project in Leeds on Wednesday (16th April) and then on to bigger and better.