Ska Bans Highlight Music of the Moment. . .After Beck Steals the First KROQ Show

Thank Frosty or Rudolph or whoever oversees these seasonal things that KROQ-FM didn’t follow a few other “modern rock” stations around the country and turn the second night of its “Almost Acoustic Christmas” shows into Happy Ska-nukkah.

But it might as well have. The bouncy ska beat is the closest thing to a dominant trend in this realm this year, and the ska bands that were on the bill Saturday at the Universal Amphitheatre--the cartoonish Aquabats and the jump-jive inflected Save Ferris, plus a surprise appearance by veterans the Specials--really pumped up the young crowd.

The problem is that most of the other bands on the bill, though not ska, seemed similarly mere music of the moment. Anyone looking for acts with staying power would have been better served by the bill offered Friday night, when the re-formed Jane’s Addiction was joined by such legitimate career candidates as Beck, Fiona Apple and Sarah McLachlan.

Flash forward to Christmas five or 10 years from now, and the only artist from Saturday’s lineup certain to still matter is, strangely enough, show-closer David Bowie, whose career has already spanned more years than the lifetimes of most of the other performers. And Bowie’s music is not even really part of KROQ’s programming--which resulted in a lukewarm reception from much of the audience.

Bowie, sporting a Mohawk, did his best, a masterful performance of mostly older hits (“Panic in Detroit,” “Fame,” “The Man Who Sold the World”), radically reworked and renewed to be as compelling and forward-thinking as ever. But he was the anomaly this night.

Whether post-grunge rock (Live, Everclear, Third Eye Blind), neo-punk (Green Day) or metalized hip-hop (311, Sugar Ray), this was music with no eye to the future. In this context, there’s no difference between the Aquabats’ silliness and the snotty punk vandalism of Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong, who pushed the Christmas tree into the crowd, spray-painted an obscenity on the set and later trashed it.

It doesn’t matter that Everclear’s Art Alexakis and Third Eye Blind’s Stephen Jenkins both seemed Saturday like real rock stars trying to say something, though with contrasting approaches--Alexakis a natural communicator, Jenkins somewhat forced with his swagger. All that matters is that they provide catchy hooks and instant pop gratification. And that makes them no different, really, from the Hansons and Spice Girls and Aquas that populate the teen-pop world.

In that sense, the two young ska bands, both Orange County products, set the tone. There’s little evidence of ambition (except perhaps the superhero-costumed Aquabats’ apparent ambition to have a Saturday morning kiddies’ TV show). And Save Ferris’ version of “Come On Eileen,” a crowd favorite Saturday, completely misses the tender, desperate plea that made Dexy’s Midnight Runners’ 1983 original so irresistible. It took the Specials, veterans of ska’s “two-tone” U.K. heyday circa 1979, to show the depths possible in this genre with the classic “Ghost Town,” the harrowing portrait of a culture coming apart.

On the other hand, if this show was only meant to be a good time, it succeeded. The energy level never flagged, save for poor Portishead, whose ambitiously moody textures, so seductive on the stunning new album “Portishead,” proved a real momentum killer coming after Save Ferris’ crowd-rousing froth.

But if these concerts can be read as sort of a state-of-the-KROQ address, the station brain trust has reason to worry from Night 2. These acts all can be (and mostly will be) disposed of quickly. Entertaining acts come along every five minutes. True artists, and the loyal fans they cultivate, are a far rarer and more valuable treasure.