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I showed up at the Sunset Park apt of my erstwhile but always estimable jogging mate Godwin Chu. He gaveme two tickets to Across the Narrows that he wasn't using.

"So have you been running?"

"Been running and been getting fatter. It's baloney is what it is."

"And what about the show? No one's going with you?"

"Kath's at a wedding, Nicole's under the weather, Tim has to count clouds. And Gabe lives approximately a light year from Coney Island, so I decided to ask him an hour before the show."

"But Tim likes Belle and Sebastian."

"Do not try to plumb the man's depths, Godwin. It's like punching the tarbaby."

"Hmm. Lame."

So, we thank Godwin not just for his tickets, but for providing the obligatory, if mild, daily Tim-sult. Not all Tim-sults can be spicy, straightforward attacks of the Kath and Boogie Train variety. Sometimes simple does the job just fine.

At the show I was the only person in shorts, and probably the only person reading the NYT mag. (Which was, for the first time in a few weeks, freaking quality. When the NYTM is on its hoss, its stories don't just illuminate their subject, but a couple other things nearby. Consider this half-graf summation of New York histories:

People have tried to define the New York essence in any number of ways. It has something to do with the racial and ethnic tangle. It has to do with talk, chatter, tension, strife, street fighting, barrios, gangs, bosses, bare knuckles. It has to do with the scrum of ideas. It has to do with a certain density of souls, with vertical living, with the inherent limitations of an island, its shoreline functioning like the rim of a pot.

Quality, and wholly necessary when confronted with occasional onstage mediocrity. The whole thing was sponsored by Playstation, who I'm betting lost a much money. Coney Island wasn't packed, and basic transit/stigma realities suggest there would be half as many folks in Staten Island. In between shows, some Staten Island sucka would come on screen and talk about a PS game and then say "Peace Out." To which I can only add, Word.

As I think I've mentioned before: I'm old, and I see music through the old man prism. One of my formative bands back in the prehistory was the now defunct Mighty Mighty Bosstones. The Bosstones could stomp your ass flat live, and one reason was they had Ben Carr, who merely danced around stage, whipping the crowd into a frenzy. Ben had one move I ever saw: two hands waving #1 simultaneously and kicking his knees high. Dumb, but effective. On albums, he was listed merely as the Bosstone. This seemed quite fresh and fun and original to teenage me. Now apparently, having Bosstone is a default choice. The bands I saw in order:

Polyphonic Spree: Pink Floyd-esque lead ins, and then lots of what can only be described as druid rock. As anyone who's read their Gary Gygax knows, druids suck. At least eight Bosstones on stage, most of them female Bjork-alikes, doing the same synchronized moves with their feet planted on the ground. Still a good visual, and all around a pretty original sounds, even if they did have unnecessary violins and harps.

Belle & Sebastian: Let it be said that I gave these neutered Kinks a chance. I put the magazine down and I tried. But "Stars of track and field you are" is the mincing-est chorus I've ever heard. They combine the sheer nutlessness of Polyphonic Spree with a self-satisfied lack of energy. No Bosstones on stage because apparently music that prompts the crowd to move is Lamey 2000. And they've got violins too, but just so they can be maudlin. Eff minus minus.

Speaking of the Floyd: One of PF's more charmingly drunken flops was "Alan's Psychedelic Breakfast", which the band originally envisioned as a song made out of nothing but samples of scraped toast, pouring milk, snapping rice krispies, etcetera. They eventually backed off that and went with a pretty straight instrumental song, but Beck pulled the whole idea off on last night:

Halfway through the set, he started into his acoustic songs, and his band just set up a table three feet to his left and started chowing down on crackers and fruit. About five songs into acoustica, Beck's getting into a tasty groove, and his band starts pounding on the table with silverware, jars of preserves, random fruit, whatever.

He played a dozen other hits, which he has, because he's been putting out music since 'Loser' came out my senior year of high school. Old.