Musical side-projects are usually fleeting affairs, of real interest only to immediate family members and pub quiz teams of the future.

No so The Last Shadow Puppets, hobby band of Miles Kane of minor indie group The Rascals and best mate Alex Turner of extremely major indie group Arctic Monkeys.

A No.1 album, Mercury Prize nomination and this tour of major venues with a 16-piece orchestra are hardly the achievements of self-indulgent egotists.

Cleverly, Turner and Kane may have improved their day-to-day bands by using this one as a separate outlet for some of the desires that often ruin successful fledgling rock acts — the need to employ a string section and attempt to match the greats of the Sixties.

In The Last Shadow Puppets they are blatant about their influences, here covering songs by Leonard Cohen (Memories), Lee Hazlewood (Paris Summer) and of course, The Beatles (I Want You [She’s So Heavy]).

Here their originals were written to suit this vintage sound, rather than shoe-horning unsuitable styles into their existing templates.

In this retro ghetto, they were spot on. In skinny suits and moptops, alternating vocals like Lennon and McCartney, the pair clearly adored raiding music’s great dressing-up box.

With grandiose string flourishes, stirring horns and producer and drummer James Ford’s powerful rhythms, tracks such as Separate And Ever Deadly and Only The Truth had a Bond-theme drama that suited the large-scale setting.

Most were good enough to justify the pair’s talk of a second album. They’ll never escape the looming shadow of Arctic Monkeys but deserve to become a great deal more than a footnote.