Los Campesinos! began as a college group in a corner of Cardiff University in Wales, and five releases and seven years later has maintained a solid fanbase amidst waxing and waning press hype over the years. Their latest release, No Blues, went largely unnoticed by the parade of best-of lists rolling in at the end of 2013, but the band brought their A-game with their current seven-person lineup, bringing a hell of a lot of depth to the boy-girl lyrics they’re known for. For a band that’s technically only got one hit, the Campesinos! can not only bring a crowd on a freezing cold night, but get away with making fun of them, too.

“You’re fu**ing cold?” lead singer and founding member Gareth Paisey laughed at the crowd after opening the show with No Blues track “As Lucerne/The Low”. His commentary sprinkled the night with some surprising moments for a band who’s known for their upbeat, perky tracks, and revealed some inner dialogue of a lead singer playing mid-sied venues five albums deep into his career. “I’ll start with the negative, because I am who I am,” Paisey admitted before launching into the on-the-nose “What Death Leaves Behind”.

In the past handful of years, Campesinos! ushed a number of important names into the spotlight with opening slots over the years (Imagine Dragons and Vampire Weekend are in these ranks), and their Tuesday night show at the Paradise was no exception– western Mass natives Speedy Ortiz opened with their signature state-bred angst, blending surprisingly well with their headliners. The group opened for their Boston and New York dates and hit the relatively young crowd with tracks from their major 2013 release Major Arcana with standouts like “Tiger Tank” and “Silver Spring”, and were right at home starting a mini-mosh while rocking the home field advantage. Lead singer Sadie Dupuis continued to be the woman I aspire to be with killer vocals, and one could see young Campesinos! worshippers becoming Speedy fans before your very eyes. With a February 8th show encroaching at Tasty Burger, that extra bump can’t be a bad thing.

With nineteen songs on their setlist, the acclaimed Welsh headliners were generous with their time and kept it current, playing a full six tracks from No Blues bravely shying away from the early albums that provided the group with their first burst of critical attention. Paisey and friends don’t shy away from pop standbys like chorus singalongs and audience-synced clapping, but the Campesinos! make it so fun you don’t feel like you’re buying into it with anything but open arms. Fans could be heard singing just as loud as the band to favorites like “Songs About Your Girlfriend” and “We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed”. Their 2008 hit “You! Me! Dancing!” still packs a punch live after all these years and car commercials later, but it was new track “Avocado, Baby” that really hit me where it hurts– in an album as introspective as No Blues, it jumps out as the danciest track the group has put out in five years, and a reminder that they still know what can shock a show back to life.

The band parsed out a million thank yous to the crowd that had come out in the snow that the Campesinos! weren’t shy about saying was “nothing”, and even signed copies of No Blues after the show after being unable to do at their last Boston set in 2011. An encore of new and old– 2008’s “Heart Swells/Pacific Daylight Time” and last year’s sublime “In Media Res” served as a reminder that through the peaks and the valleys, the Campesinos! know how to put on one hell of a show, even if they’re teasing us the entire time.