Afternoon Baseball

Can't Keep -- Pearl Jam: Starts off Riot Act, and is a rock song, but something is different about it. The big fat snare drums opening up with a light strumming keeping time together, the breathy, laidback vocals, saying "I wanna shake, I wanna wind out, I wanna leave, This mind and shout." Never really breaks into a full-fledged solo, but it doesn't need to. The drumming and darting guitar lift it up throughout.

I Got You -- Stone Temple Pilots: Yet another Scott Weiland heroin song (off of No. 4), but with fat twangy guitar, a rolling bass line, some piano chords, a solo out of late 1950s rock and some gorgeous ballady singing. Never rushes along, and shows STP realizing subtlety can work too.

Shakin' My Cage -- Joe Perry: A song that emphatically does not rock soft, and is actually new. The opening track off the Aerosmith guitarist's new album, souding nothing like latter-day Aerosmith. Obviously, this is a good thing. Wicked guitar riffs and solos and vocals that are just good enough to carry the day. It's like the 1970s never left for Perry, and I don't mean that he's on drugs.