At Johnny Brenda's on Thursday, singer John Gourley stood at a right angle to the sold-out crowd, his scraggly hair and bushy mustache all but obscuring his face. But while his stage presence was minimal, there was nothing hesitant about the band's set, which ran to nearly an hour and a half. Although the songs on The Satanic Satanist are relatively compact compared to the prog-pop of their previous albums, the live versions of "Work All Day" and "Everyone Is Golden" spread out to fill the space. Based on the whoops that greeted their extended instrumental workouts, it's safe to surmise that some of the band's swelling popularity comes from a crossover to the jam-band audience. But their falsetto melodies spoke to something sweeter and less sprawling.

Portugal. The Man's ungainly moniker was inspired by David Bowie's idea that art should be larger than the individual, a debt repaid by a solid cover of Bowie's "Moonage Daydream." But some of the band's songs are too big for their own good, puffed-up constructions with only vague statements at their core.

Better was the sly, reggae-tinged satire of "People Say," which breezily proclaims, "What a lovely day, yeah, we won the war. May have lost a million men, but we got a million more."

Even their former mayor could have figured out who the "president's son" who "got no soul" in that song referred to, but even their political criticisms came off as essentially good-natured. Not even a million deaths could dampen the mood.