The Ogden Theatre, East Colfax Avenue’s art deco-style moviehouse-turned-concert hall, is a haven for cool hipsters on this sweltering summer night.

Inside, the British alternative rock band Cocteau Twins play stately, brittle music that wafts out from the stage and floats over the audience like a benevolent — if not bored — angel. The members stand stock-still at their instruments and microphones, and the show’s visual dynamics — such as they are — are all in the lighting effects. Several hundred hard-core fans of the band crowd the stage and the upper balcony, where underage fans are segregated. While they offer their appreciative applause for every song, the several hundred more who got free tickets from local radio stations are restlessly milling around the back of the room.

The owner of the Ogden, Doug Kauffman, is restless too. He’s the man who booked the Cocteau Twins through his concert promotion company, Nobody in Particular Presents (NIPP). Surveying the scene from the bar, beer in hand, he wonders why so much new music has so little soul. During one dolorous drone, he says to nobody in particular, “It’d be great if they played ‘Dancing in the Streets.’ But I’m not holding my breath.”