After a near-decade loitering on the college rock margins, Seattle four-piece Death Cab for Cutie saw an appearance on US teen soap The OC power their fifth studio album, Plans, to number four on the Billboard chart last year. Two sold-out Astoria shows indicate that their star is similarly rising here. This quantum leap was unexpected - as Death Cab are such an unassuming and understated band. Unabashed emo rockers, their first album saw singer-songwriter Ben Gibbard effectively whispering his journal over gently diminished chords, like Belle & Sebastian shorn of their pigeon-toed coyness.

They have blossomed since, adding a cerebral edge to their emotionally literate indie-rock, and now sound like Keane with a pulse. Keyboard-driven opener The Marching Bands of Manhattan is beauteous, Gibbard quietly regretting the passing of youth over yearning, tumbling guitar arpeggios. Soul Meets Body, equally heavy with intimations of mortality, surprises in its casual intensity, while What Sarah Said is a sepia reverie. Death Cab have the habit of couching profound laments at the unbearable lightness of being over a music of polished urbanity.

The band is clearly Gibbard's vessel: in addition to guitar and keyboard duties, he drags on a second drumkit to run through a few paradiddles. He loses momentum on Different Names for the Same Thing, an overwrought slab of melancholy worryingly reminiscent of Phil Collins.

For the encore he returns alone for an acoustic I'll Follow You Into the Dark, and the Astoria happily bellows along to this shadow-song about the inexorable passing of time. It's a fittingly paradoxical end to an oddly bewitching evening.

· At Academy 1, Manchester, tonight. Box office: 0161-275 2930. Then touring.