Used is highlight of E Center show

THE USED, 30 SECONDS TO MARS, AIDEN, ETC., E Center, West Valley City, Monday

WEST VALLEY CITY — Monday's E Center concert was like the winter warm-up for the summer Warped Tour.

"The Rockstar Taste of Chaos" tour featured a half-dozen bands combing pop-punk, alternative and post-hard-core genres. While some of the bands did a good job adapting to playing an arena-size venue, others appear to be destined for a career as warm-up bands on the second stage of radio-festival shows.

The Used, however, is not one of those second-rate bands.

The Orem-based quartet received a hero's welcome from the hometown crowd. "I'm excited. I'm so excited right now," lead singer Bert McCracken told the E Center crowd, which filled about three-quarters of the lower bowl, including the packed general-admission main floor. "This is family night here. I grew up next to every single one of you."

It appeared to be a more grown-up, mature Used that took the stage Monday. McCracken was comfortable working the audience and didn't try to scream his lungs out after the first two songs, even though he still got the crowd surfers and circle-pit dancers excited with "Take It Away."

New songs "Liar, Liar," "Handsome Awkward" and "Find a Way" blended in nicely with crowd favorites "I Caught Fire" and "All That I've Got" — and even an acoustic version of "On My Own." But the mosh pit got going in full force again at the end, with "A Box Full of Sharp Objects," on which McCracken got some singing help from Aiden frontman Wil Francis.

30 Seconds to Mars was the biggest disappointment of the evening. The band put a lot of style into its show but little substance. Frontman Jared Leto spent too much time putting long, supposedly dramatic pauses between songs and trying to get the crowd into cheering contests.

When the band got around to actually playing a song, Leto couldn't find the right balance of taking care of the vocals himself and letting the audience sing the songs for him. But the Asian-theme stage setting (complete with fortune cookies that Leto threw into the crowd) and Leto's head-to-toe white samurailike outfit was entertaining, if a little over-the-top.

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