POP MUSIC : The Replacements Face Their Future

The Replacements opened their Hollywood Palladium concert with the same challenging question that’s hung over the group for years now: “Should we give it up? . . . “ they sang, portraying themselves with “one foot in the door, the other one in the gutter.”

Looking at the packed ballroom and the audience’s enthusiasm and the charged performance, you might wonder why the question would even occur. But the triumphant scene in Los Angeles doesn’t reflect the big reality for the critically acclaimed Minneapolis band: It continues to teeter on an uncertain future, still unable to break through into even a moderately secure level of popularity despite its decade-long stature as a beacon and inspiration for a generation of rockers.

Friday’s Palladium show, then, had an us-against-the-world undercurrent, and as it began to blossom into something special late in the evening, it accumulated a power that made the band’s lack of acceptance seem like a cruel, absurd joke.

Especially so since the concert marked another step toward the professionalism that the Replacements scorned for so long, when their perversity and internal tensions made them a symbol of defiance and a fascinatingly unpredictable attraction.

Even more than their last L.A. show, the Palladium concert was a no-nonsense statement of intent: No flubs, no songs cut off halfway through, no arguments, no sulking, no avoidance of their best material, no heavy attitude, no jokey outside songs (choices this time ranged reasonably from T. Rex to the Dead Boys to Keith Richards--”Happy,” put together on the spot).

Truly unpredictable bands being hard to come by, it’s natural to mourn the end of the circus, but the compensation that leader Paul Westerberg offered Friday made it an easy trade-off to accept. With a pile of great new additions to his songbook and revitalized performances of old staples, he made a case for himself as the most prolifically brilliant rock singer/writer of his class.

The foursome (including a new drummer this time) played with the straightforward instincts of a bar band, but also mounted the urgency and ambition of a group with something at stake, and with a poet at the helm.

Fierce rockers, aching ballads and lots of the easy-flowing tunes from the latest album “All Shook Down” added up to a compelling emotional palette as Westerberg’s intimate expressions unfolded into embracing anthems. Because most of his songs are intimate rather than theatrical, it was surprising how well they connect to the excitable rock crowd at the Palladium. Maybe the audience’s energetic, churning response was more to the agitated sprit of the music--reflective, angry, disillusioned, determined--than to the beats themselves, which were light and swinging as often as they were hard and driving.

Another change: Westerberg didn’t light up a cigarette all evening, which may or may not explain the intensity of his singing. Raspy, soulful and expressive, he recalled the kind of heroic vocal performance associated with a Fogerty or a Springsteen.

As the show went on toward the two-hour mark, Westerberg kept pulling out more great songs--more than even a fan might have realized he had in stock. The new ones (including an encore of “My Little Problem,” featuring a guest vocal by Johnette Nopalitano) already seem inscribed in the Replacements set list, and Westerberg revisited key songs from the landmark mid-’80s albums “Tim” and “Pleased to Meet Me.” He seemed determined finally to give them their real due and to show what you get when he puts it all together.