Gotan Project, Barbican, London, ****

You can see how the Gotan Project may have rubbed people up the wrong way. In theory, their world-dance schtick – tango music given a modern DJ makeover – could have been music for chintzy cocktail lounges, car adverts and the sort of chill-out compilation albums bought by people who buy only one album a year. Nouvelle tango: it's a nice idea, but isn't it all concept and no pulse?

So much for the theory. In practice, Gotan – back-slang for "Tango" – are a far fizzier proposition. The Paris-based core trio of Philippe Cohen Solal (DJ), Christophe H Mueller (programmer) and Eduardo Makaroff (guitarist) make traditional Argentinian tango new by finding in its lustiness a correlative with deep, soulful house-music vibes, the missing link between the two being a thick, dubby bass sound. It's a perfect fit, and their 2001 debut album, La Revancha del Tango (Tango's Revenge), has duly wowed the world-music and clubbing fraternities alike.

Much of their success, too, must be down to how vital and organic they are as a live band. Fleshed out as a collaborative seven-piece, they eschew, say, a front man in favour of frisky trade-offs, Serge Amico's bandoneon (a raunchier, Argentinian accordion) matching Line Kruse's jittery violin, Makaroff's strapping guitar work and Arnaldo Zanelli's busy piano for urgency, as Cristina Vilallonga's yearning vocals drift over the top. Meanwhile, the sharp-suited Solal and Mueller work their decks, cutting in hip-hop samples and subliminal scratching over dancefloor beats.

It's a suave show all round. For the first third of the set, a screen covers the stage, and the band are visible only as silhouettes against red and white lights. Film footage is smartly used: some illicit tryst, say, or formidably fast-hoofing tango-dancers' feet. (Solal used to work as a music supervisor for films.) Six songs in, a couple tango their way across stage front, and you can imagine the thirtysomething-plus Barbican crowd cursing their lead feet as one. By the time the screen drops, a warm, intimate relationship between band and audience has been earned, and the sense of glee as Gotan rip through the complex, 10-minute "Triptico" is infectious.

Indeed, there's nothing cold or conceptual about Gotan's mix of genres. It's intuitive and felt, Kruse's violin and Amico's bandoneon cutting across each other with zip and flair, and Solal working a sample of Eminem's "Without Me" into the final encore with playful wit and oddly apt ingenuity. Has there always been a secret tango element in the rapper's music? The Barbican's rapturous response says it all: tango's revenge has been served, and it is sweet.