First Night: Maximo Park, Northumbria University, Newcastle

If success can be measured by the number of impersonators present in the audience then Paul Smith, Maximo Park's vocalist, has surely hit the big time. Tonight's crowd for the Newcastle quintet's homecoming bash is awash with the heavy-fringed and severely parted hairstyle that has become Smith's trademark.

Perhaps this level of adulation is of little surprise given that the band's success is very much a celebration of the North-east's growing cultural confidence. Maximo Park count themselves among the flew of bands from the area that have gained notoriety for their no-nonsense, post-punk tunes and defiantly proud North-east accents. Like Wearsiders The Futureheads and Field Music, Maximo Park wear their accents like badges of authenticity.

However, just as Channel Four's Big Brother announcer sounds like a cartoon version of the North-east (he speaks like no Geordie, Mackem or sand dancer ever heard in the area before) so the current collection of North-east bands are in danger of becoming parodies of their hometowns. Or, in other words, their claims to gritty realism are as artificial as their music.

Which doesn't have to be a bad thing. Great pop, from David Bowie to Lily Allen, XTC to Kaiser Chiefs, has long been the spiritual home of the overplayed or hammed-up accent.

Maximo Park is no different. Indeed their strength comes from the fact that they are very much aware of their own theatricality. Witness the combination of the high camp of Paul Smith's style and the bleached white funk punk meets Americana ambience of their songs.

It is the obsession with Americana that came to the fore last night, despite the local voice. Their latest album, Our Earthly Pleasures, plays testament to obsessions with the pre-grunge alternative rock of the US.

So on tracks such as "Our Velocity" they echo Husker Du and the Replacements while Washington DC hardcore outfit Fugazi are never far from the mix. Only the melodies, and, yes, the accent, keeps things grounded in the North-east. Not that Maximo Park have turned to Testosterone Rock. Thankfully they have enough humility to reign in the simplified excess.

Their performance is further phased from the bland by Smith's between-song banter which betrays a sardonic humour that revels in the absurd. Sadly, however, the band fall short of their lofty performance pretensions. Smith's scissor-kicking, legs-akimbo displays of pop-god histrionics lack that all important ingredient - charisma.

And as Smith paces the stage his performance falls sadly into the realms of the local band so, despite the newfound internationalism of their Americanised sound Maximo Park remain a Newcastle band.