With the (unfulfilled) prospect of a snow day no doubt dancing in many a head last night, DCist ventured down to Clarendon to catch two up-and-coming groups, Headlights and Evangelicals, at the Iota Club and Cafe.

It was well worth the trip. Local Death Cab for Cutie acolytes We Were Pirates opened things up, and while there was occasionally something hummable, the bare-bones trio arrangements offered little variety save for a plucked bass solo on the band’s last tune. Luckily, Headlights proved the perfect remedy, revealing their intentions right off the bat with a slow-burning “Get Your Head Around It” that began with an atmospheric synth and a slow, jangled guitar melody but ending with pounded rolling snare and triumphant ba-ba group vocals. Here was a group proud to show off their polish and finding new ways to arrange your standard guitars-bass-keys-drums to dress up their solid, but unspectacular songs into something quite exhilirating. The band continually gained momentum, and the second half of the set (“So Much For the Afternoon”) — heavy with bobbing bass lines reminiscent of Booker T. and the MGs via more recent indie touchstones like Saturday Looks Good to Me — featured a band locked in and firing on all cylinders, their driving pop coated in a nice haze of effects pedals and feedback.

They saved their best for last though. “Cherry Tulips” — the single off their strong new release Some Racing, Some Stopping — was much more rousing than on record, reminding of the Rosebuds but with a wonderful guitar outro, heavy with reverb. Like the wistful “On April 2” earlier in the set, it provided just enough tempo change from the otherwise bouncy setlist to demonstrate that Headlights possess a self-awareness not so common in your average blogworthy indie pop group.