TORONTO - What's the difference between consistency and predictability? It's whether or not you crave surprises.

Blue Rodeo playing a Toronto concert in August: No surprise. Blue Rodeo turning in a tight, well-paced, musically and vocally accomplished show: No surprise. Blue Rodeo's fans basking in the warmth of their heroes: No surprise.

The best and yet somehow worst thing you can say about the Toronto sextet's show last night at the Molson Amphitheatre is that the 7,500 souls in attendance got exactly what they paid for. With no surprises.

Which is not to say these mainstays of bluesy, rootsy, accessible Can-rock don't mix it up or inject a bit of freshness here and there. Just that laid back, stretched out mellowness was definitely the order of the evening.

Leading off with Til I Am Myself Again, frontman Jim Cuddy wasn't two verses into the song before the pungent (and yes, predictable) waft of herbal refreshment emanated from several locations in the crowd. Make that mellowness on top of mellowness.

Without a word of greeting, the band then moved into the rockin' Rose Colored Glasses and the not quite so rockin' Better Off As We Are, arriving at the heartfelt and beautiful Side Of The Road from 1995's Nowhere To Here, which also included an extended instrumental interlude that gave pretty much all six band members a chance to shine.

Only then did Cuddy get chatty, giving his usual humble thanks to the audience for coming on by to see them play. Hey, no problem, Jim. Plus we're getting a huge second-hand buzz out here in the crowd. Someone pass the chips.

In the interest of the aforementioned freshness, the lovely and talented (cliche, but in this case true) Kathleen Edwards was invited on stage to duet with Cuddy on Bad Timing. "She has a bit of a potty mouth, if you've ever seen her show," Cuddy warned of Edwards. "But she won't be doing that, because my mother is here."

Cuddy's wasn't the only mom in attendance. Befitting Blue Rodeo's 22-year history and enduring popularity, the crowd spanned everyone from tarted-up teenaged girls to silver-haired gents to friendly young couples who brought their parents along. How cute is that?

The band did their expected reworking of several of their songs for the live show, like Greg Keelor's extended, awesome and somewhat psychedelic guitar noodling on 5 Days In May, or the very unfortunate overall mangling of Diamond Mine, thanks to some strangely discordant keyboards and a couple of bursts of ear-splitting feedback.

Cuddy took a turn behind the piano for Rain Down On Me, his already clear and strong voice taking on a new and stirring depth. Cuddy and Keelor also gave Lost Together a slightly guitar-heavy tinge, turning it from the ultimate sappy wedding song -- seriously, how many times have you heard this played as the bride and groom's first dance? -- into something with a bit of a cool, crunchy edge to it.

And there was at least one goosebumpy moment in the evening, when Keelor launched into Hasn't Hit Me Yet, but turned over singing duties to the crowd for the first verse. They happily obliged, before Keelor jumped in to earn his paycheque. The band left the stage of a high note indeed, returning for an encore that included Try and Love And Understanding.

Earlier in the evening, former Thrush Hermit frontman Joel Plaskett opened the show with his tight three-piece band. The gangly Haligonian, who was later invited up to perform with Blue Rodeo, is as charming as he is skilled at songwriting, finishing his very solid set with Extraordinary.

Maybe not the most appropriate song to lead into Blue Rodeo's show. But presumably Plaskett doesn't have a tune in his repertoire called No Surprises.