Summer Jam Turns Into Endurance Test for Fans

Summertime radio-sponsored package concerts, in which numerous acts cram a single bill like an overcrowded subway car, can be grueling endurance tests for audiences, who must suffer through any number of indignities to hear squib-sized sets from acts of wildly varying quality. On Sunday, the Beat’s 12th annual Summer Jam 2001, sponsored by R&B; and hip-hop station KKBT-FM (100.3) at Verizon Wireless Amphitheater and benefiting selected Southern California charities, packed more sizzle in the stands than it did on stage.

The quality of these showcases often tends to improve as the day progresses, when bigger names start to appear, but Summer Jam’s peaks and valleys came intermittently. The early-bird acts were young, restless and generic. Ray J and Mr. Short Khop were too much testosterone too early; lover man Jimmy Cozier was a sweet pillow talker, technically smooth but uninspiring.

Tyrese and Tank are buff singers with appeal to the ladies and pumped-up voices, but their flaccid sets were just dead weight. R&B; belter Lil’ Mo was her own censor, teasing the crowd with song snippets and then telling them to buy the album if they wanted to hear the rest.

Sunshine Anderson--the only other female act on the bill--is a rookie with real promise. Her short set, which was ignominiously lumped in with the other warmup acts, was a series of gutsy kiss-offs delivered with brassy self-assertion.

Dave Hollister and Musiq Soulchild were the only R&B; solo acts to use live accompaniment, and it made a world of difference. Both artists reject the facile, sex-you-up rhetoric of their contemporaries in favor of a subtler brand of seduction that relies on the vocal nuance and traditional love narratives of forebears such as the Isley Brothers--the only veteran act on the Summer Jam lineup.

Looking like the granddaddy of all Mack Daddies, 60-year-old Ronald Isley, with his beige suit and black cane, was suavity personified. Singing the band’s biggest ballads in a voice that can still swoop into a high register during the quietest moments, Isley demonstrated how restraint can be just as effective as melismatic acrobatics.

Hip-hop acts were poorly represented Sunday. L.A’s Tha Liks used their vocal dexterity to enumerate ways in which to get blotto. Veteran duo EPMD delivered maddeningly truncated versions of its old hits, but its enervating set got a brief power jolt from Redman and Method Man, who reeled off some vocal buckshot.

Jagged Edge, a kind of urban ‘N Sync, wore matching warmup suits and gamely tried to work a synthetic party vibe for a crowd that had been roasting in the heat for close to seven hours. The day’s two biggest acts, Usher and OutKast, represented the concert’s anticlimax and its creative peak, respectively.

Using a recorded track and a clutch of dancers, Usher sang two songs, pulled off some tricky moves and checked out.

Show closer OutKast turned the place out, and demonstrated why it is one of the most exciting hip-hop acts on the planet.

After nine hours of listlessness, the people in the crowd got on their feet for OutKast and stayed there, while the Atlanta duo stirred up a furious tempest of sharp-witted art-rap.