One thing's for certain: nobody can accuse Live of not trying. During the course of a relentlessly impassioned 90-minute performance, the four friends from York, Pa., seemed hell-bent on exorcising their demons -- or summoning their gods -- for a near sold-out audience that had clearly found theirs. The focal point for this immaculately conceived mayhem was diminutive singer Ed Kowlaczyk, whose mighty baritone and shamanistic gestures were cause celebre for the faithful, who had their lighters ready when the group launched into "Lightning Crashes" near the end of the 17-song show.

\\Drawing heavily from their new album, "Secret Samadhi," Live opened with a suitably anthemic rendering of the bracingly ominous "Rattlesnake." Elsewhere, augmented by dramatic lighting and a cathedral-like stage decorated with pillars and ornate chandeliers, the band did what it does best: deliver hand-wringing rock that is at once densely muscular and deadly serious -- or at least, serious-sounding. Reaching for a Rock of Meaning somewhere between Pearl Jam's populism and U2's elegiac '80s spirituality, Live came off merely as pretentious high school poets performing on a grand scale.

\\The single-mindedness of Kowalczyk's lyrical preoccupations (what's wrong with the world and how upset he is about it) was made clear when Live tore into its breakthrough hit, "Operation Spirit," a six-year-old song that tackled the same Big Issue as new tunes like "Century." Although the song had lost little of its nervy, quaking power, Kowalczyk's improvised bellows that "I found God and he looks absolutely nothing like me!" sounded overbearing. The plodding "Unsheathed" and heavy-handed "Freaks" underscored the singer's almost Vedder-esque self-importance. Kowalczyk's somber dedication of "I Alone" to Wednesday's bombing victims in Israel had more emotional resonance, however.

\\In fact, it was during Live's more restrained moments -- the understated poignancy of "Turn My Head" and the meditative sprawl of "Gas Hed Goes West" -- that the band evinced the kind of depth it strives for on arena-ready numbers like "Lakini's Juice." Guitarist Chad Taylor's harmonic flourishes on "Gh