By Sam Adams

 

For The Inquirer

 

The high-pitched shrieks that greeted Maroon 5's arrival at the Spectrum on Saturday night left no doubt that the L.A. quintet can make tweens swoon with the best of them. But while they owe a good chunk of their success to the heartthrob appeal of singer Adam Levine (and the rest to their inescapable breakthrough single, "This Love"), Maroon 5 can play their instruments as well as pose with them. They're the boy band that actually is a band.

Maroon 5's influences aren't difficult to spot, particularly Levine's affinity for Stevie Wonder's high-register quaver, but they mix and match exuberantly.

 

"Won't Go Home Without You" begins as a straight rewrite of the Police's "Every Breath You Take," but the verse's clipped guitar opens up into a full-bore singalong chorus as Levine turns from downcast dumpee to determined suitor. Besides, with their progenitors re-forming as shadows of their former selves, why not remind them how it's done?

 

The few lines of "In the Air Tonight" Levine slipped into "Secret" mustered more conviction than Genesis packed into a three-hour concert, and playful nods to Led Zeppelin and Guns n' Roses paved the way for reunions yet (or never) to come.

 

Loping easily across the stage, Levine put as much into working the crowd as he did hitting the high notes. During a break in "She Will Be Loved," he spent so much time urging couples to kiss that he lost his place in the song.

 

Rather than set the mood with a bunch of like-minded crooners, Maroon 5 gave themselves a tough act to follow by picking the Hives as their opening act. Sporting prep-school suits and a collective sneer, the Swedish five-piece plays loud, fast garage punk with the barely controlled frenzy of 1950s rock and roll and the self-awareness of a musicology seminar. The Hives' singer, who calls himself Howlin' Pelle Almqvist, aped the madman's glare of Jerry Lee Lewis or Eddie Cochran, while his guitarist and brother Niklas (aka Nicholas Arson), chopped out variations on the Who's "Can't Explain."

 

Wading into the crowd attached to a mile-long microphone chord, Almqvist seemed set on converting the audience one listener at a time. "Another song by the Hives, another couple thousand Philadelphia people won over to our cause," he crowed, the wink in his eye just visible past the smirk on his face.

 

 

Finally a positive review! :cheer:

Finally a positive review! :cheer:

 

Exactly. ^_^ I don't think of them as a boy band, though..and yes, Adam is sexy, but the guys are very talented. :P

They could be described as a boy band but not everyday one :lol:

They are so much more :wub:

Wow. Best review I have read in ages. Won't Go Home Without You, a re-write of Every Breath You Take :wub: