Garth Brooks

After prevailing upon an arena full of fans Tuesday to sing the chorus to his 1990 ballad "Unanswered Prayers" without accompaniment -- twice in a row -- Garth Brooks sat back against his drummer's kit and murmured into his signature headset microphone. "This is so cool," he said.He'd been relentlessly pumping up the audience during this second of nine sold-out performances at the Sprint Center, telling fans that the previous night's crowd had been amazing, assuring them they'd know every song because "it's all the old stuff," bounding around the stage, distributing winks and waves. It's part of Brooks' shtick to act like every show is the best he's ever given, and he'd been working it. But for a moment, he really seemed to suspect this was the ultimate night.

It wasn't. Because tonight he'll do it again, filling this arena with more joy than anybody else will bring to any big room this year. There will be more surprises and surefire favorites, more overwhelming fan love, more backslapping with his spotlessly polished band. Only two shows into his first extended round of concerts since 1998, Brooks has already reclaimed his title as the people's pop champ, and grown restless enough to start mixing things up.He brought out his wife (and opening act), Trisha Yearwood, for their duet, "In Another's Eyes," and he accompanied her on guitar as she sang her 1993 hit (with Don Henley), "Walkaway Joe." Though the second show was shorter than the previous night's, he closed it with a treat for enthusiasts: his excellent cover of Billy Joel's "Shameless," which he recorded in 1991.Who knows what trick Brooks will pull next? That he'll strive to surprise is as guaranteed as the rowdy singalong to "Friends in Low Places" that happens nightly, right before he gets everybody weepy with his philosophical number, "The Dance."His talent for being spontaneous and full of hokum in equal parts is one reason Brooks is the most commercially successful solo artist in recording history. (He was just declared such, again, by the Recording Industry Assn. of America, reclaiming the title from Elvis.) Only a few other artists -- maybe Frank Sinatra or James Brown -- have been able to command a stage so comfortably.Brooks also shares much with Bruce Springsteen, including a gift for making every live show a celebration of itself. In fact, with his hearty drinking songs and sentimental ballads, Brooks might be the Springsteen that the characters in classic Springsteen songs would actually like.Yet Brooks doesn't often get the respect these titans do. His music is slick, and embedded in a genre -- country -- that tastemakers tend to prefer more rough-edged. Many of Brooks' hits were written by others, a markdown, especially for male superstars, since the rock era. And unlike many great interpreters, Brooks isn't blessed with an exceptional voice; on Tuesday, he strained off and on, sometimes leaning toward a bellow, and momentarily losing his way when matched with his more vocally accomplished wife.Yet when it comes to selling a song, Brooks is a master. He knows just when to make a broad vocal gesture, and when to pull back; he can make the most hackneyed phrase ring like a true confession. Melodramas such as "The Thunder Rolls" and the rodeo ghost story "The Beaches of Cheyenne" swelled to heavy-metal-worthy proportions Tuesday, tempered by romps including "Two Piña Coladas" and those soul-baring outings in which Brooks stood alone, playing guitar.Whatever the song's mood, Brooks maintained command by staying just a little bit distanced, building the drama with relish and boisterous style. Like a mega-church pastor, he guided the night's mood, letting the music and the crowd's delight lift him up, but not overcome him.When he retired seven years ago, Brooks said his main motivation was the desire to be closer to his three daughters, the youngest of whom is now 11. In a consummately sappy flourish, Brooks announced at show's end that his daughters, who'd been too young to see him perform before he retired, were there cheering him on. He must have been delighted to give them that gift. But he was also surely thinking, the PTA's going to seem awfully dull now.

Artic Monkeys

Several hours before he is scheduled to take the stage, Alex Turner, the guitarist and lead singer of the Arctic Monkeys, enters his dressing room and sits on an ice chest filled with water and energy drinks. It is not at all drafty inside, but Turner is wearing a jacket zipped to the neck and a blue knit cap. Like his three bandmates, Turner has bad skin, looks about fifteen -- he's actually twenty -- and still lives with his parents.

These facts have not stopped the Arctic Monkeys from becoming a major sensation in their native Britain. When the band's first album, Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not, was released in the U.K. earlier this year, it sold more than 350,000 copies its first week, becoming the fastest-selling debut in British history. Rock icons from David Bowie and Mick Jagger to Oasis and the Strokes are all fans.
In the U.S., Whatever People Say debuted in the Top Forty after its February 21st release; the single "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" had already been in the iTunes Top Ten for a month. The band will launch a major U.S. club tour on March 13th in San Francisco -- all dates are already sold out.

The Monkeys themselves -- Turner; guitarist Jamie Cook, 20; bassist Andy Nicholson and drummer Matt Helders, both 19 -- seem to be wisely recoiling from the hype. They have declined offers to appear on the BBC's Top of the Pops and, pleading already scheduled tour dates, they skipped the Brit Awards, the U.K. equivalent of the Grammys. Tonight, playing a college campus in the sleepy English town of Norwich -- most famous export: mustard -- they are sandwiched in the second slot of a four-band bill, beneath the much-lesser-known indie band Maximo Park. Asked about the upcoming U.S. tour, Cook shrugs and says, "It's pretty hard to break America, innit?"

The band hails from Sheffield, an old steel town in northern England, best known, musically, for producing the unholy trinity of Pulp, Human League and Def Leppard. "We all sang 'Let's Get Rocked' every morning at school," Turner notes drily. The son of a secondary-school music teacher, Turner took piano lessons as a kid but hated theory and practice. ("My dad teaches me more stuff now," Turner says. "I'll be home, messing about with a song on the piano, and he'll say, 'What are you trying to do?'") The Monkeys formed in 2002; friends since high school, Turner and Cook had received guitars the prior Christmas and taught themselves a few chords. They began rehearsing every Tuesday evening. "Our early songs were bollocks," says Turner. "A lot of them had the word 'doobie' in them."
Because you smoked a lot of pot?

"No. Because it was a funny word for spliff."

In Norwich, the hangarlike, unadorned venue is packed with true believers when the Monkeys take the stage. The band's hook-filled songs are both taut and sprawling, often packing funky breaks, metallic crescendos and weird pop flourishes -- e.g., the falsetto backing vocals on "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" -- into a single song. Turner favors long, literary-sounding titles: "You Probably Couldn't See for the Lights but You Were Looking Straight at Me," "Perhaps Vampires Is a Bit Strong But . . ." He's most often compared with Mike Skinner, a.k.a. the Streets, and rightly so. Like Skinner, his lyrics deal with the pedestrian realities of ordinary dudes who hang out in bars and clubs, get hassled by doormen and have trouble making time with stuck-up chicks.

Before signing with Domino Records, the indie label that broke Franz Ferdinand, the Monkeys built up huge grass-roots buzz by passing out free CDs at shows to fans, some of whom began posting the songs online. When "Dancefloor" debuted at Number One last year, it blindsided many in the British music industry and wildly excited others looking for a way to use the Internet to save the record business. "It was completely accidental," Turner says. "We never posted any songs ourselves."