EDMONTON - When Bon Jovi released a box set in 2004, they defensively called it 100,000,000 Bon Jovi Fans Can't Be Wrong - using a cliche normally reserved for McDonald's, Adam Sandler movies, Elvis in Vegas and other seemingly unpleasant things inexplicably enjoyed by a lot of people.

Why protest so much? Might the members of Bon Jovi be kept awake at night from a gnawing feeling deep in their hearts that they are the suckiest rock band ever to suck from the suckiest decade in rock history?

Might they fear the catty remarks that 100,000,000 fans can indeed be wrong? Are they haunted by cruel voices mocking them with one of their own most memorable lines: "Shot through the heart and you're to blame, you give rock a bad name?" Are they withered by jokes like about how if there was a tornado during a Bon Jovi concert there would be no casualties because all the trailer parks would be empty? Yes, that's over the line. Many Bon Jovi fans live in houses.

But no, they can't think any of that. Jon and his band of merry men are supremely confident, it's part of their charm. Because they now further invite attacks on their supposed "hard rock" roots by releasing a country album, Lost Highway.

The band played quite a few selections from it last night at Rexall Place. More than 14,000 fans came to witness Bon Jovi Gone Country - one part competent Bon Jovi cover band, one part spirited honky tonk, all of it firmly in the middle of the road and topped by the radioactive charisma of Mr. Jon Bon Jovi, whose name in Esperanto translates to "giver of good joy."

Coming after a half-throttle, double shot opening of Livin' On a Prayer and You Give Love a Bad Name - in which Jon let the crowd do all the heavy lifting on the high notes - Bon Jovi unleashed the jug band within. All that really distinguished this lacklustre material from their previous lacklustre material as country was a fiddle in the band, an acoustic six-string over Jon and a funny hat on Richie Sambora.

I wonder how the embattled guitarist likes the new direction. In one of the tunes early in the three-song country-rock ride, he uncorked a blistering solo that wandered off completely into the wrong key. Oh, well, maybe it was jazz.

This wasn't so much a case of coming out of the country closet in full cowboy regalia complete with buttless leather chaps. It was more of a meandering strut to the other side of the fence in an otherwise sturdy, predictable and depressingly ordinary show whose most interesting visual feature was the frontman's arsenal of smoky glances into the cameras and his splendid demonstrations of rock 'n' roll posery. In between, deeply affected vocals delivered more in the manner of an actor than a true rock singer, and there's a big difference, at times it looked like he was doing a low-impact karate workout.

Although they warmed up a bit as the show wore on, the band lacked oomph in a good deal of the classic-hits portion of the show. Jon and band showed more spark in the romping We Got It Going On - another new one which sounded like a Big and Rich song because it was written with Big and Rich - than any of their older stuff, the stuff, let us not forget, the good people of Edmonton paid to hear last night.

To be fair, I'll Sleep When I'm Dead showed life. And in songs like Bad Medicine, the sheer enthusiasm of a crowd joyfully shouting out all the words was stirring in itself. The fun of concerts like this, whatever you think of the headliner, is at least half the crowd's doing. The bonus of Jon's increasingly suggestive stage patter, along with his deft eye-work, drove the ladies absolutely wild.

OK, let's face it: Everyone knows that Bon Jovi is music for gals who who go gaga over Jon - but what last night's concert suggested is that Bon Jovi is really hard rock for country fans. It's music to bang your head softly to without flipping your hat into the dashboard of your pickup truck.

And it has been said that a lot of modern country music sounds like bad '80s pop. Coincidence or a match made in heaven?

The choice of opening acts was interesting: Doc Walker and Tupelo Honey, two area up-and-comers, one a Prairie hot country group that wouldn't be out of place at the Big Valley Jamboree, and in fact wasn't, the latter an aggressively radio-friendly hard rock band that wouldn't have been out of place at Stage 13, and also wasn't. (Both the Big Valley Jamboree and Stage 13 are/were produced by Panhandle Productions, the same promoter that brought us last night's Bon Jovi concert. Coincidence?)

Doc nicked Rush for a big ending, Tupelo channelled the mighty Thor, God of metal. Doc sang of the difficulty of both loving and not loving, while Tupelo dealt with "feelings" in the modern rock context, some of which had to do with love. Give Tupelo the clear victory in the lead- singer contest, but both bands played material that tried too hard for hit potential. Sometimes it worked.

However, these were two entirely different bands, extremely unusual at an arena concert - and the weird thing is that both went over equally well with the people who were waiting eagerly for Bon Jovi, just as the headliner's new country songs were eagerly received. Read into that what you want.