David Couse live at Whelan's, Dublin

There’s a party in Whelan’s tonight, but the guest of honour is cowering behind sunglasses.

“This way, you can’t see the fear in my eyes,” deadpans David Couse, ex-singer of beloved despondency-pop messers A House, last seen walking off the Olympia stage four years ago leaving several thousand bereft fans screaming for fifteen minutes after the house lights came up, refusing to go home and weeping like orphans. So what’s to be afraid of?

Well, perhaps this isn’t the comeback gig we’d dreamed of. There aren’t remotely enough new tunes and instead of a full band, there’s only a keyboardist and a small side-table – strewn with notebooks and tattered slips of paper – to keep this famously visceral frontman company onstage (“I need my knickknacks,” he explains, endlessly goofing and fidgeting, sifting frowningly through them like someone’s dotty grandmother).

And in a way this shy, nervy, jokey, jittering re-entry into our lives is exactly what we wanted. Old faves ‘You’re Too Young’ and ‘Endless Art’ (the latter assisted by some hilariously self-conscious beatbox loops) are still bolshy and bittersweet; and several exuberant brand-newies, notably ‘In A Second’ and the swoonsome, punch-drunk ‘You’re Intoxicating’, transcend their current unadorned state and go off absolutely brilliantly, like firecrackers.

Look into our eyes, Dave… so lovely to see you again.