Live Review: Keith Urban at the HP Pavilion, 06/16/07

Live Review: Keith Urban at the HP Pavilion, 06/16/07

Amid power ballad barrage, Urban asks San Jose crowd if it's got a pulse: Aidin Vaziri | Let's get something straight: Country musicians don't do rehab. They're supposed to drink obscene amounts of alcohol, beat their spouses and die in bizarre tractor accidents. Facing a near-capacity crowd at San Jose's HP Pavilion on Friday, however, Keith Urban clearly had other ideas. Fresh from a three-month stay at the Betty Ford Clinic, the 39-year-old New Zealand transplant seemed more determined than ever to pull away from his Nashville roots. He recruited a sideways-cap-wearing DJ to warm up the crowd with songs by AC/DC and Blur. The musicians backing him, coordinated in the sort of print T-shirts and machine-distressed jeans you might find on the clearance rack at Target, looked like they were on loan from the house band on "Rock Star: Supernova." And the way Urban brandished his guitar during solos suggested he had spent many nights on his tour bus poring over old Lenny Kravitz videos -- which would explain at least one thing he has in common with wife Nicole Kidman. After delivering a rapturous opening shot with "Once in a Lifetime," the first track from his current album, "Love, Pain and the Whole Crazy Thing," Urban settled into a gaggle of power ballads from the poodle-haired school of Bon Jovi and Night Ranger. "Friday night, San Jose!" he said. "You're still alive out there?"