These guys are doing fine anyway, make no mistake. If that wasn't a capacity crowd welcoming the Oshawa-spawned ensemble back to Metro Toronto and, specifically, into the Mod Club Theatre on Friday on the closing night of a cross-Canada tour to launch its dandy new disc, Sidelines of the City, then there was still sufficient popular interest in the local CD-release gig to lure a handful of scalpers out on College Street in defiance of a brewing, not-quite-there winter tempest.

Inside, Cuff the Duke did as it always does, expanding and elevating a time-tested roots-rock formula – lots of early Tom Petty and Blue Rodeo, some pre-suck Son Volt and a maybe-unconscious hint of Meat Puppets – into something decidedly more ... I dunno ... cosmic. Cosmic, but still "earthy." The combination doesn't really make sense, I know, but that's the way Cuff the Duke rolls.

The sage deployment of visceral guitar noise and a stern command of spacious, prog-worthy dynamics have been this band's secret weapons since co-founders Wayne Petti and Paul Lowman and the original Cuff lineup were welcomed as wee sprouts barely out of high school into the gone-but-not-forgotten Three Gut Records fold with 2002's Life Stories for Minimum Wage. Consignment to the overburdened "alt-country" category has nevertheless left the band overlooked and misread as, perhaps, a bit too "ordinary" to get fully caught up in the subsequent Canadian indie-rock hypestorm.

Sidelines of the City finally, properly nails on record Cuff the Duke's knack for catapulting down-home stomp into an epic orbit usually occupied by British guitar bands. But onstage is still where the group – now enriched by the subtle guitar heroics and on-point harmonies of Dale Murray and rock-steady drummer Corey Wood – unfailingly reminds you that you haven't been paying nearly enough attention to its talents.

Friday's set cockily opened with the irresistible new single "Surging Revival" and old fave "Blackheart" before conjuring down-home post-shoegaze doom to rival Black Rebel Motorcycle Club on "If I Live or If I Die," out-Petty-ing Tom with Petti's AM-worthy gem "Remember the Good Times" and then nearly bursting every heart in the place with an extended, arena-worthy assault on the ooey-gooey "Failure to Some."

More impressive than the musicianship required to turn it on and off as reliably as this band does, though, was the fact that the crowd already seemed intimately acquainted with the new songs that dominated the set. Cuff the Duke, maybe your moment is now.