Rundgren, the pop mastermind who wrote the '70s hits Hello It's Me and Bang On the Drum All Day and produced influential bands like the New York Dolls and XTC, wore a red velvet jacket and a floppy blonde-on- top haircut and commanded center stage like some kind of skinny ostrich.

He had the rubbery voiced detachment to recall original Cars singer Ric Ocasek (who refused to participate in this reunion) and the confidence to tinker with the script. Rather than mimicking Ocasek's deadpan delivery in You Might Think, Rundgren ad-libbed a shriek during the classic "you - kept it going" bit toward the end.

With Rundgren as the ringmaster, these New Cars drew on their new-wave weapons - a fiercely tight rhythm section, with bassist Kasim Sulton (of Rundgren's old band, Utopia) and drummer Prairie Prince (of The Tubes) and bleeping, blooping, boinging, unforgettable hooks from original keyboardist Greg Hawkes.

The Cars are one of the few big-synth '80s bands whose hits sound barely dated. And while Tuesday night's show was essentially a greatest-hits exercise, Shake It Up, Hello Again, My Best Friend's Girl and especially the explosive You're All I've Got Tonight came across less like nostalgia than reinvention.

The New Cars - with Sulton replacing the late Ben Orr and Prince replacing original drummer David Robinson, who also declined - indulged Rundgren with Bang On the Drum All Day and I Saw the Light. (The band's fifth member is original guitarist Elliot Easton, who grinned pretty much the whole time.)

Opening the rainy show - which drew a paltry 6,200 fans, making the lawn seem big enough for a baseball game before the sun went down - were recent Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees Blondie.

Singer Debbie Harry, wearing a fluorescent light-green hoodie and striped sweatpants, gained power as the hourlong show went on, and the closing one-two-three punch of classics Rapture, One Way Or Another and Heart Of Glass almost redeemed the set.

"I'm gonna win ya!" Harry declared, of course, in One Way Or Another - and she pretty much did.

Pre-gig press about this gig include: