You can say this about Nickelback: This band knows what works, and sticks with it.

Nickelback packed them in Sunday night at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center, delivering a sometimes repetitious, rock cliche-riddled performance that would have rocked without the T-shirt bazookas, an overblown drum solo and singer Chad Kroeger's rock-god antics.

Alt-metal heroes Staind and Daughtry -- featuring "American Idol" contestant-turned-grunge-rocker Chris Daughtry -- shared the SPAC bill on Sunday night.

The near-sellout crowd of 24,000-plus fans couldn't get enough of Nickelback, leaping to their feet and screaming as the band launched into a tight reading of "Animals" to start the show. Kroeger, doing his best David Lee Roth impression, started his rock shtick from the first song, reciting plenty of hackneyed rock lines -- he actually said "let's do this one for the ladies" as an intro to "Far Away" -- to fire up fans, who were already stoked to see the band.

He turned up the stupid when he invited Daughtry (the band) out to fire shirts out of air-powered T-shirt bazookas as he and the band played an instrumental. And there was no shortage of indoor fireworks and flames spouting during the show. Rock excess, thy name is Nickelback.

When Nickelback played, they rocked, the band's infectious/repetitious rock-pop driven by Kroeger's scratchy rasp and the band's crunchy twin-guitar sound. Songs such as "Someday," "Photograph" and "Woke Up This Morning" satisfied, Kroeger's throaty vocal and the band's harmonies on the mark as fans sang along. But the band's cover of Elton John's "Saturday Night's All Right For Fighting" was way lame.

If you've seen Nickelback once, you've seen Nickelback. Sunday night's show was everything you'd expect -- and nothing more.

Staind served up a pounding 50-minute set that was as satisfying as it was loud. The alt-metal warriors still bring the thunder live.

Lead singer Aaron Lewis wore a cool demeanor as he planted himself in front of his microphone and sang. If he seemed withdrawn, it didn't show in his performance; Lewis' voice dripped with passion on "So Far Away," "Outside" and "It's Been Awhile."

Opening act Daughtry rocked in their SPAC debut, grinding out 45 minutes of melodic rock fueled with buzz-saw guitars and topped with singer Chris Daughtry's intense, raspy voice. Daughtry (the man) takes his rock seriously and it showed on Sunday night.

With the seasoned stage presence of a mature rocker, Daughtry belted out post-grunge anthems such as "Used To," "Home" and "It's Not Over," coming off like a cross between Eddie Vedder and Live lead voice Ed Kowalczyk.

Daughtry may be best known for his stint on "American Idol," but that will soon be little more than a footnote in his career. This guy can sing and he knows what it means to rock.

Lol, The title says it all...

It sucks that they only gave Staind 2 little paragraphs...

They were probably much better than Nickelback anyways..

Staind may have only gotten two paragraphs, but they were righteously given their props w/the guy having nothing but good things to say about them, while he really ripped into Nickelback.

I sat during Nickelback rather disgusted w/what came AFTER Staind (totally not having a clue of why!), and getting WAAAY more of a kick out of seeing Jon to my right watching them lol. I wonder what he was thinking. When he took off, I left, too...my show was over, even though Nickelback was still playing LOL.

I left as soon as Staind was done. The last song I heard live from that trip just had to be Mudshovel, not some gay Nickelback song