Xiu Xiu’s Jamie Stewart sings in a never-quite-breaking tremble, the

sort of delivery that, say, early Bright Eyes used to telegraph

emotional distress. But Stewart takes things to even more gut-wracking

and theatrically messy extremes, plumbing depths of self-loathing

oversharing that would make any emo cherub blush, or possibly vomit.

Latest album Always is more of the same, but also the group’s most sharply focused and weirdly poppy album in years, trading the band’s often noisy and avant-garde stylings for relatively straightforward electro-pop backings. It’s this animating tension, between the accessible and the unnerving, that marks the best of Xiu Xiu’s work. Don’t be surprised if they favor the latter live, though. With Yamantaka, Father Murphy. ERIC GRANDY

Sun., May 27, 8 p.m., 2012