Seth Lakeman is the thinking woman's folk crumpet and the Zodiac was packed to the rafters with hen parties ogling his toned physique and expertise on the tenor guitar. Seth is now the best-known of the Lakeman brothers who hail, appropriately enough, from the edge of Dartmoor. His brother Sean, was reduced to playing, if not second fiddle, a frantic rhythm guitar while Seth warbled his way through a host of ballads, most taken from the exceptional Freedom Fields album.

Encountering a first name like Seth, straight from Cold Comfort Farm, the fresh listener might expect trad folk with a bucolic flavour, but the Lakeman boys are clean-cut and ambitiously modern. The other two members of the band, Cormac Byrne on bodhran and percussion and Ben Nicholls on double bass, contributed hugely to the energetic and distinctive sound.

The subject matter was the most traditional element, with Lady of the Sea, about a Cornish shipwreck (how many have there been?), and The Colliers, about a mining disaster that left 140 working men dead. The Riflemen of War and King and Country covered familiar ground but Final Lot was a particularly affecting obituary.

While guitars predominate on Freedom Fields, Seth Lakeman is equally at home on the fiddle, attacking the strings with such fury that his bow is ripped to shreds. When accompanied by Byrne alone, he sounded a little like a young Marc Bolan soaring on flights of Celtic whimsy, with Byrne playing the part of Steve Took.

The set was all too short but the packed audience rocked reverentially and sang along to The White Hare and Setting of the Sun, two of the most played tracks from Freedom Fields. If Show of Hands put the west country on the map, there is every chance that Seth Lakeman will eclipse Knightley and Beer and make it the centre of the folk universe.