M83 glistens in the Starlight

For a band that has made formidable inroads within shoegaze electronica, distorted art metal, and ambient electronic circles, M83 knows how to make sharp left turns yet stay smoothly on the road.

Then again, with each record since 2001, the French band has shown it understands the idea of change that is radical yet seamless, with music influenced equally by the Laserium grandeur of Tangerine Dream and My Bloody Valentine's wall of woe.

Since 2005, a series of musical switcheroos have been decided by breathy singer/guitarist Anthony Gonzalez - M83's co-originator - and fans have hung on each decision. And yet, M83 surprised and amazed again on Saturday night. Playing to a crazily enthusiastic crowd at the Starlight Ballroom, Gonzalez's quartet played a brand of glossy, epic synth-rock best suited to the quintessentially 1980s flicks of someone like director John Hughes.

It was akin to Eddie Van Halen playing keyboards on "Jump": weird, angering, then joyous. The confectioner's-sugar whispers, digital drum slams, and layered synthesizer lines of "Kim & Jessie," live and large, were shocking, as much an effervescent epiphany as it a rude awakening. Suddenly, there was no line between the prog pop of Journey and the jittery electro of Justice; everything was one.

The disco hi-hats, oscillating whirrs, and ascending guitar chords of "*" chugged while tugging at heartstrings. When the Christmasy choir of angelic harmonies that was "Moon Child" began to swell (emulated as it was in Gonzalez's spindly guitar riffs), you were tempted to look up, expecting to see wings. Gonzalez even laced "Don't Save Us From the Flames" with patented brooding guitar noise for the diehards.

The arpeggiating synthesizers and fluttering vocals of "Graveyard Girl" and "We Own the Sky" were the cinematic sweet stuff, the bliss of the kiss at the end of

Sixteen Candles

, breathy and neatly breathtaking.

School of Seven Bells, from Brooklyn, opened the show with an equally filmic sound. Only the group's movie was an intimate drama with a lovely, humble resolution of sliding noir guitars, quietly beeping keyboards, and the two coos of the Deheza twins, Claudia and Alejandra. Their siren sounds seem to float above their finest moments - "Connjur" and "Half Asleep."