Daughtry gets all the basics right

Ben and Sophie Ulene had trouble elaborating on what drew them to the Daughtry concert Monday at the Orpheum Theatre.

“I liked him on ‘American Idol,’ ” was all Ben came up with beforehand, referring to singer Chris Daughtry, the 2006 “Idol” fourth-place finisher who fronts the quintet bearing his name. The group has this year’s biggest-selling album and, as of Sunday, three American Music Awards. Beyond that, Ben only shrugged.

That’s OK. He’s only 11 and his sister just 9. And they were attending their first rock concert, accompanied by parents Elisabeth Bassin and Doug Ulene.

It proved a perfect entry-level rock show, square in a tradition running from, oh, the Monkees through the Spice Girls. That’s no insult. Anything that recruits kids into the circle of music fandom is good.

The shaven-headed singer has star-enough appeal and a strong voice, the things that served him well on the TV talent competition. And he’s got all the crucial rituals of the basic rock show down (singalongs, stage-prowling, “What’s up, Los Angeles?” shout-outs), as well as that tinge of dark mystique without any actual sense of danger.

The songs are appealing, if generic -- the power ballads that threaded through the set, from “Feels Like Tonight” to the hit “Home,” are of that too-crafted variety that have proliferated in recent years, songs that could just as easily be country or pop or R&B; with tweaked arrangements. But that’s part of their popular appeal, not just to kids, but also to the healthy number of older fans on hand.

Daughtry was entertaining if not overly personable, stone-faced most of the time -- C’mon, man, you have plenty to smile about! -- offering no sense that he has any desire to use the platform he’s been given for anything other than to be famous. (Credit him for playing mini-Idolmaker, having tapped two promising acts to open, neither with even a debut album out: L.A. quartet You Are I Am and Toronto four-piece the Midway State offered very appealing short sets, linked by effective echoes of Coldplay.)

The closest thing to a revealing moment came when Daughtry closed the night with the neo-metal crunch of his own “There and Back Again” in medley with “Hey Man, Nice Shot” by the band Filter. Here he came alive, performing with exaggerated abandon, giving the impression that if he had his druthers, he’d make this his main pursuit rather than the more mainstream pop-rock that’s made him so successful.

It’s doubtful the Ulene kids cared about that. As the show approached its conclusion, Ben -- who along the way had sat entranced, sang along on cue and pumped his fist -- found words to describe what he’d seen: “Awesome,” he said. “Amazing.”

Yeah, he’s in.