Only a resurgent Amy Winehouse prevented Goldfrapp's new album, Seventh Tree, from topping the chart this week. And tickets for this one-off show, ahead of their summer tour, sold out in five minutes. But no one could accuse the group fronted by the singer and songwriter Alison Goldfrapp of simply repeating a winning formula. The new show, like the album, was a world away from the garish display of dancefloor electronica that characterised their tour to promote the Supernature album of 2005.

Instead of searing disco strip lighting, at the 750-capacity Union Chapel the band was bathed in a pulsating, liquid-light effect that recalled the “happenings” at the UFO club in 1968. The musicians were all dressed in white. Incorporating a string section, and a classical harp player alongside various personnel on keyboards, acoustic guitars, electric bass and drums, they looked like a gang of fallen angels, ranged across a stage ringed by orange candles, and overlooked by a kaleidoscopic arrangement of stained-glass windows.

While Alison Goldfrapp's musical partner Will Gregory stayed in the wings - he has not toured with the group since their second album, Black Cherry (2003) - the singer remained a dominant presence both vocally and visually. Resplendent in a short, flowing, pink smock and pixie boots, she sang in a shivery, breathy tone, full of sensual import. Her appalling diction only contributed to the air of mystery as she started with one of the group's oldest songs, Paper Bag, and then went into the most recent single, A & E, which she sang in a husky, low whisper.

The sound was steeped in the woozy, bucolic-psychedelic sounds of the Beatles circa the Magical Mystery Tour, particularly on the long drifting coda to Little Bird and the huge choral finale of Caravan Girl. There were some wonderful “symphonic” flourishes from the strings towards the end of Clowns, a lyric that she mangled into spectacularly unintelligible shapes.

It wasn't just the new songs that were performed in this vintage style, and a version of their old T.Rex-influenced hit, Number 1, was given a similarly textured treatment with surprisingly rewarding results, while You Never Know was tweaked to accommodate a trip-hop backbeat, its chords falling with a hefty thump amid the shadows of the mock Gothic decor.

They returned for triumphant encores of Happiness and Some People, songs that reminded you of the days when bands such as the Beach Boys and the Beatles regarded the making of pop music as a matter of pride and unfettered ambition. Like them, Goldfrapp has revealed a rare talent for the lost art of constant reinvention.

Goldfrapp are at the Festival Hall, April 18; then touring from June 21. Details: goldfrapp.co.uk

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