One of Thursday night’s hottest shows — literally — was the Speck Mountain/Le Loup/Papercuts/Bowerbirds/His Name Is Alive/St. Vincent extravaganza at the Knitting Factory. The first-rate lineup drew a crowd that only grew bigger, and sweatier, as the night wore on, but the performances made enduring the balmy conditions more than worthwhile.

Speck Mountain’s atmospheric, fever-dream pop began the evening. Singer/bassist Marie-Claire Balabanian has an angelic face and a voice to match, with a drawl as sweet and slow as molasses. Her singing, coupled with the spacious drones of keyboardist Kate Walsh and guitarist Karl Briedrick, brought to mind the gentler side of Bardo Pond or an especially trippy Mazzy Star, particularly on “Stockholm” and a slow-motion version of “Will the Circle Be Unbroken.” Despite some tuning problems — which required Breidrick to make an emergency guitar switch — and a few meandering moments, their set pulled in listeners like a tarpit.

Le Loup provided a sharp contrast to, and wake-up call from, Speck Mountain’s blissful musings. Not that Le Loup’s melodies weren’t pretty — many of them sounded like folk tunes handed down for generations — but the seven-strong band and their sparkling, storming sounds were almost more than the Knitting Factory’s stage could hold. Each band member played at least two instruments (including French horn and a percussion instrument looked like a flour sifter) and nearly all of them sang, so it was more like hearing 14 people play at once. The men and women of Le Loup tussled and tumbled over each other as their songs rode peaks and valleys, but Sam Simkin acted as a conduit for all of the band’s energy, channeling it in his hunched shoulders, shaking legs and stomping feet. Le Loup’s music spanned modern Appalachian hymns to more citified, almost funky songs, all delivered with an anthemic power that recalls the Arcade Fire (with a slightly lighter touch). Though the way each of the band’s songs started out small and built to a peak got a little repetitious, Le Loup’s passion for their music saved it from being formulaic. Based on the large crowd they drew — which only grew bigger and sweatier as the night wore on — and the photographers staked out at the front of the stage like paparazzi, Le Loup is definitely a band on the rise, and their set showed why.

Papercuts were up next, and though their beards and sandals suggested they might break out some freak-folk, instead they delivered darkly jangly, garage-psych tinged pop drenched in reverb that belied their San Francisco roots. “John Brown” was the set’s shining moment, full of shimmery twilight drama and Jason Quever’s androgynous vocals. A few songs dragged, and like Speck Mountain, the band had a few technical difficulties. However when it all came together, Papercuts’ bouncy, bummed-out songs made feeling bad sound really good.

When Bowerbirds took the stage, they looked like the unlikely but whimsical combination of a poet, a gypsy and a grad student. When they played, their music made perfect sense. Phil Moore’s crooning voice is pitched somewhere between Devendra Banhart and the Shins’ James Mercer; likewise, Bowerbirds’s charming songs ranged from exotically tinged folk to pretty indie-pop. The band’s three-part harmonies and restrained melodies gave them a more elegant, almost courtly, sound than many of the other groups pursuing this sound; though Bowerbirds’ music is gentle, the band was busy at every moment, switching instruments and multi-tasking in a very 21st century way.

Depending on what side of their sound they chose to focus on, His Name Is Alive could play almost any CMJ showcase, from noise to folk to indie-pop. For this show, they combined all three. Though it wasn’t as far-flung and fractured as some His Name is Alive shows over the years, it was the night’s most experimental set, combining harmonium, violin and electric kalimba with tight rhythms and guitars that went from soft to squealing at a moment’s notice. It was also the show with the most audience particpation. Warn Defever handed out tambourines and sleigh bells — the night’s most popular instrument — to the crowd, who shook them during the entire set, and led sing-alongs of Stars on ESP’s “Bad Luck Girl” and a slowed-down, strutting cover of “Walkin’ After Midnight.” Though the set list focused on songs from Xmmer (which Defever urged the crowd to buy, saying that otherwise, “We’ll have to sleep in the park and eat bugs”) and Detrola, His Name Is Alive pulled out a few old favorites as well, including a soothing, spiritual version of “I Can’t Live at Home in This World Anymore” that showed off Andy FM’s vocals perfectly. Other standouts included a taut “What Color Was the Blood” and a cranked-up version of “C.A.T.S.” By the time they left the stage to a fanfare of harmonium drones, it was clear His Name Is Alive didn’t have to worry about eating bugs that night.

Though much has been made of Annie Clark’s time with the Polyphonic Spree and Sufjan Stevens, her stint with Glenn Branca’s 100 Guitar Orchestra seems to be the biggest influence on St. Vincent’s live show. A wide spread of effect pedals laid at Clark’s feet, and as she played guitar — which she brandished like it had a mind of its own and she had to wrestle it to behave — she danced, incorporating the pedals into her steps. Lanky and gamine in a short black satin dress and bright red lips, Clark was off in her own sound-world at times, her eyes rolling back in her head as she conjured up sweetly unpredictable songs from Marry Me as samples and loops crashed around her. However, she touched down to check in with the audience from time to time, at one point asking, “How are you? I don’t mean that as a cheap ploy for applause, I mean how are things in your lives? Are you OK?” “Marry Me” itself was one of the set’s brightest highlights; its Carole King-through-the-looking glass vibe struck a chord with the audience, along with “Landmines” and her gutsy, playful cover of the Beatles’ “Dig a Pony,” as well as a bizarre anecdote her bassist told about seeing former MTV veejay Matt Pinfield cross the same street three times in a row. It could all fit together only in St. Vincent’s skewed but lovely world.