Reviews

If there was any doubt My Morning Jacket was more than just another guitar-rock band, it came during Saturday night's encore of Erykah Badu's "Tyrone."

RICKY MOON/Special Contributor

My Morning Jacket, fronted by Jim James, brought dazzling genre-bending style to the Palladium.

My Morning Jacket has played the song lots of times. But this time, Ms. Badu materialized on the Palladium Ballroom stage, flowing Afro and all, and helped the group transform "Tyrone" into a wailing showstopper.

"My God!" singer Jim James said, looking stunned after she left. "I don't know how we're gonna follow that."

They couldn't – but then again, they didn't have to. In the two hours before Ms. Badu made her cameo, they'd already staked their claim as one of rock's most dazzling genre-bending bands.

The show was like AM radio circa 1975: A little bit country, a little bit Philly soul, funk and folk-rock, all wrapped together with melodies that stuck to you like Krazy Glue.

Every now and then, they switched to FM for noisy Neil Young-ish guitar jams or the psychedelic epic "Touch Me I'm Going to Scream Pt. 2." There were side trips into reggae ("Off the Record") and more than a few songs that sounded like vintage Who.

But MMJ wasn't being eclectic for the sake of eclecticism. You got the feeling Mr. James was trying to let all the voices in his head have their say, from the blood- curdling Roger Daltrey-style roar in "Gideon" to the comic falsetto of "Highly Suspicious." Lest anyone miss the humor, he wore a cape and sang with a towel draped over his noggin for much of the show.

The Kentucky-based band was lit by an arena-worthy light show, complete with five mysterious glowing orbs. Mr. James seems to have a light fetish: He rhapsodized about the flickering lights of Reunion Tower while thanking his Dallas fans.

"By the grace and power of Reunion Tower, you stand tall and never let us down," he said.

Saturday night, you could say the exact same thing about My Morning Jacket.

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