Alicia Silverstone in "Clueless" may have been right. Counting Crows are definitely "complaint rock" in the purest sense of the term. But that doesn't mean they've forgotten about the "rock" part. In a sold-out show on October 20 at Ryan Arena in Evanston, they hammered home their tunes with an emotional committment that obliterated any thoughts of "complaining" or "whining." These guys aren't pouting; they're dead serious.

Opening their 90-minute set with the first three songs from their second album, "Recovering the Satellites," the Crows made it clear from the start that a passionate assault was their ultimate objective. The slow build of the first song, "Catapault," ended in a furious explosion of crashing sounds, with Ben Mize's furious drums driving the band toward a gutwrenching climax. Leaving the breathless crowd in the dust, they next attacked the hard- edged rocker "Angels of the Silences," where guitarist David Bryson's biting solo took center stage. Throughout, lead singer Adam Duritz writhed, thrashed, and emoted through voice and body with all the subtlety and grace of a high-school theater star trying to tackle "Hamlet."

On record, Counting Crows excel in creating polished and passionate pop. In their live shows, their performances are embroiled with the emotional fury of a collision between two unstoppable forces: Adam Duritz and the band. A friend of mine once commented that the reason Counting Crows were so successful is that Adam Duritz is a true rock star, while the rest of the band are merely great musicians without that "star" quality. They may not be "rock stars" but they certainly know how to rock. Duritz's self-absorbed and at times maudlin vocals are matched and thwarted at every turn by the music, just as his vocals challenge the band, with the two dueling back and forth until both explode.

Watching Duritz sing, one gets the impression that he would be up there doing his thing even if the band left and most of the audience did, too. Each song is approached in a new way vocally, thwarting those in the crowd eager to match him word-for-word through singing along. He's utterly self-absorbed and rarely acknowledges his bandmates onstage, usually with a quick air-guitar pantomime or a brief sideways glance. But even if they exist almost oblivious to one another onstage, their goal is the same. When they unite almost without knowing it, in the climaxes of tunes like "I'm Not Sleeping" and "Murder of One" (their set closer), the conflict momentarily ends and a united attack begins, with Mize's drums in the lead. He kicks up the fury while the rest of the Crows follow, Duritz wails, and the crowd is left spent.

Aside from the intensity of their live set, the Crows are noteworthy for their fearless experimentation in the daunting context of an arena crowd. A three-song acoustic set was placed in the center of the show, including an acoustic version of their radio smash hit "Mr. Jones" that redefined the song and ended all hopes of a dancing, sing-along love fest to the tune in the final encore. They also performed "Have You Seen Me Lately?" from "Satellites" twice, once in an electric rocking version and again later in a sparse acoustic arrangement, featuring only Duritz, Bryson, and Charles Gillingham on piano. During the quieter parts of "Around Here" in their encore, Duritz was unafraid to actually ask the crowd for quiet with a "shhhhhh" into the microphone. Rather than giving the crowd what they expected, the Crows focused instead on giving their audience a show they never knew they wanted.

Counting Crows closed their October 20 show in Evanston with an obscure cover penned by one of their friends back home, "Wise Blood." As the song closed, the band united in vocal harmonies that belied the musical tensions that had dominated the evening. The band took their bows, and Duritz remained on the stage for a good five minutes, shaking hands and tossing Halloween candy into the crowd. Meanwhile the audience left exhausted, emotional casualties in the ongoing battle between the passion of Adam Duritz and the fury of Counting Crows.