If your name was Conrad, why would you change it to the even less euphonious Merz? There's a story behind it, as there is to almost everything about Bath's Conrad Lambert.

He got into music late after spending his 20s in Israel and Outer Mongolia, and took his name from the inside of a German army jacket. Despite not looking like anyone's idea of a rock star, he quickly established a sound that is like no other.

Merz, his DJ and a programmer explore electronica's hidden corners and use the findings as counterpoint to his strange, reedy voice. The result is as compelling live as it is on the single Many Weathers Apart, establishing Merz as one of the country's more original talents.

That he looks as if he should be working in a motorway services (he'd dressed for it, in fluffy jumper and gold chain) only adds to the charm.

Clearly unprepared for a heaving Dingwalls, he'd only rehearsed seven songs. Nor had he got around to putting together an "act". The spasms that overcame him during the long DJ intervals were a nod to dancing, but mostly he just pointed himself at the mike.

Merz navigated the disjointed rhythms of Many Weathers as emotively as he did the starlit balladry of Lotus, but really hit his stride on the global funk of Lovely Daughter.

But dance-related words such as funk are deceptive, because this was really about one man and his songs. The core of the Merz experience is Merz, whose globe-trotting past has endowed him with a gawky, outsider quality.