San Diego’s Crocodiles wear their influences well. Named after Echo and the Bunnymen’s moody 1980 debut, the title of their own first album, last year’s Summer Of Hate, was also the title of a collection of recordings by Charles Manson, the man who turned the California dream into a nightmare. A hazy concoction of propulsive beats and shoe-staring white noise, Summer of Hate’s blog-buzzing lead-off single ‘I Wanna Kill’ didn’t so much recall The Jesus and Mary Chain’s ‘Head On’ as envelop it in a cloud of grinding nihilism.

Though more refined, for the most part recent second effort Sleep Forever brings more of the same, vocalist/programmer Brandon Welchez and guitarist/synth man Charles Rowell having decamped to studios at Joshua Tree in the Californian desert with Simian Mobile Disco’s James Ford.

Bonding with the Arctic Monkeys and Klaxons producer over their shared love of Harmonia and the minimalist garage punk of eccentric GIs The Monks, Welchez and Rowell plundered the studio’s vintage equipment for an album that’s a solid, albeit unsurprising successor to Summer Of Hate. Though often seething with characteristic malevolence, there’s a tenderness in evidence here, Welchez’s vocals often recalling the lazy sweetness of Bobby Gillespie at his most wide-eyed, while tracks such as ‘Girl in Black’ echo the Paisley-patterned romance of The House Of Love’s heyday. The confrontational posturing of their days with old band The Plot to Blow Up the Eiffel Tower may be largely behind them, but this gig should nevertheless be a memorable swirl of dense white noise, poppy melodies, shades-wearing sass and even the odd Deee-Lite cover.

Captains Rest, Glasgow, Sat 2 Oct.