It's a Herculean task, but one must slog through mucho bullshit to connect with the Living Things. Given the "Berlin" brothers' pyro-tendencies — first it was pictures of George W. Bush, now it's "dirty" dollar bills — stilted stunts (busing in a bunch of homeless folks to dance onstage at South By Southwest) and all-around self-importance, this St. Louis band should have been consigned to the ash heap of hard-rock history. But on 2009's Habeas Corpus, its glam-metal boogie sound, like Oasis covering the Stooges, can be forcefully taut, punchy and danceable. And sometimes, as on the single "Let It Rain" and the even catchier (and more Killers-esque) "Oxygen," the political double-entendres rise above instantaneously dated delusions of arena anthems or pseudo-revolutionary rhetoric. — Roy Kasten
4 p.m. Monday, May 11. Vintage Vinyl, 6610 Delmar Boulevard, University City. Free. 314-721-4096. Also at 9 p.m. Monday, May 11. Off Broadway, 3509 Lemp Avenue. $10. 314-773-3363.
