Listen to Comet Gain for only one or two songs and risk walking off with the impression of a routine indie band—scruffy and likable, no need to write home. This would be a mistake: Given time, the long-running British band is a revelation, a largely unheralded treasure of the underground. The band performed at Music Hall of Williamsburg last night, its first New York show since 2001. In that time, the musicians did not break up, reunite, slip out of fashion, into fashion and then out of fashion once more; they just didn’t bother playing here. In an age of ready availability, absence can be bliss. The venue was not packed, but the cluster of fans were enthused—a cult defined.

The New York label What’s Your Rupture? recently issued Broken Record Prayers, a compilation of singles that Comet Gain released over the past decade. It’s an apt showcase for the sloppy band, and the ostensible reason for its presence in Brooklyn last night. Comet Gain came to town short a member—guitarist Jon Slade does not fly—appearing as a five-piece. They were fronted by singer-guitarist David Feck and Rachel Evans, who stands at center stage, singing and vigorously clapping like a cheerleader. Feck is Comet Gain’s songwriter and sole original member; Evans is its secret weapon. The interplay between the two singers, along with the group’s ragtag charm, was reminiscent of the Mekons. Its tiny jumpy songs, with Velvets guitars and drone from a Vox, funnels an army of the stubborn and underappreciated: the Clean (whose “Beatnik” is covered, beautifully and loudly, on Broken Record Prayers); the Pastels (namechecked onstage during a Hitler joke); and Television Personalities (whose “Part Time Punks” was requested and performed, briefly, as an audience sing-along led by Evans).

The night was fun, sloppy, simple; a bit of a throwback. It is sure to be repeated when Comet Gain next tours, sometime in 2017, in a yet-to-be-opened club in future indie haven Murray Hill.