Looks like a Brueghel, said my companion, as we viewed the throng from the upstairs bar. We could see hip-swingers, private dramas, loose-limbed dancers, a girl shouting secrets in a friend's ear, diners scoffing food, nodding smokers, earnest listeners. All sightlines led to the epicentre - the white-hot energy of the four musicians down below.

The music of John Scofield and his young sidemen is light years away from the neo-Dixieland peddled by many jazz-funk players, though the groovy patina of the material has retro appeal. All of it was composed or arranged in rehearsal or on the bandstand. Adam Deitch plays as hard and fast as a speed-metal drummer, but the inflection of the funky patterns he hammers out with bassist Jesse Murphy leaves all the space his leader needs. Nothing sounds forced or contrived, neither overintellectualised nor dumbed down.

Announcing Idiofunk, Scofield says he used to worry that it was "way too stupid. Now it's my favourite track." The tune has one of those catchy hooks that burrows into your brain and sits there with a big smile. Yet Scofield is incapable of playing dumb: his improvisations spin naturally into variations and harmonic developments that stretch beyond the bluesy blueprints of riff-based funk. Using a table-top set of little machines, brilliant rhythm guitarist Avi Bortnick kicked off Uberjam with an Africa Bambaata-like pulse that mutated into wild, unfettered blowing. Scofield reminded me of a great saxophonist, like Sonny Rollins or Ornette Coleman. He shares their invention and stamina, but he can do this within an electrified idiom that keeps everyone on their toes. Rarely has stiff-backed electro sounded so fast and loose. Rarely has the tune of Blue Moon sounded so hip.

The first encore was Bortnick's sublime Tomorrow Land, evoking everyone's favourite in-car guitar grooves - rock, country and folk flavours stirred into a darker brew. Scofield plays both what's expected, and what you never expect, and it is always delicious.