Teen toppers

Like the annual KISS Concert of 'JMN's sister station, KISS 108, this relentlessly promoted charity event for Project Bread was also a public-relations bonanza for 'JMN, featuring some of pop's and R&B's biggest names, including Salt-N-Pepa, Coolio, and Montell Jordan. Lending star-power schmooze backstage were Red Sox slugger Mo Vaughn, Patriots star Willie McGinest, Boyz II Men's Shawn Stockman, and former New Kid Jordan Knight. "We feel we've put together a concert that represents, as far as the line-up, our sound as a radio station," said WJMN program director "Cadillac Jack" McCartney.

Backed by pre-recorded DAT tracks, most of the acts briefly sang and flexed over their own one or two hit songs -- only balladeers After 7 had the good taste and chops to bring in a live band. Relatively interchangeable male R&B vocal groups Silk and Shai bump-and-grinded their way to girlish screams; female groups Xscape and MoKenStef sang, predictably, like wanna-be divas.

Everyone's favorite little sister, 16-year-old Brandy, breezed through her 15-minute set looking cute in her leopard-print miniskirt and black mod boots but sounding as if she'd need a lot more hours with the vocal coach before she's ready for her next tour. Six-foot-eight R. Kelly sound-alike Montell Jordan, whose monstrous "This Is How We Do It" was a crowd favorite, didn't have a repertoire much deeper than that one hit.

Rapper Coolio, however, provided some of the evening's highlights, including his set-closing megahit, "Gangsta's Paradise." Dressed in a black preacher robe, Coolio did his best Jesse Jackson impersonation while the beefy singer LV came as a surprise guest to testify on the refrain.

Having just received the Billboard single of the year and rapped alongside Stevie Wonder the night before at the Billboard awards in New York, a weary Coolio chilled backstage and spoke with reporters. "You know what I'm going to attribute it to," he remarked of the phenomenal worldwide success of "Gangsta's Paradise."? "The spirit of [Stevie Wonder's] `Pastime Paradise' [from which Coolio's hit samples its melody." After the recent cancellation of Yo! MTV Raps, Coolio remains one of the few rappers still seen on MTV and heard on "Rhythmic Crossover" stations like WJMN. "I think people identify with me because I never said I was this or that, I never tried to be bad or hard, and I'm not much of an egomaniac," Coolio deadpanned, adding of his audience, "When they see me, they know that I'm just like them."

The evening's headliners, Salt-N-Pepa, tore through their string of pop-rap hits like "Push It," "Let's Talk About Sex," and "Nothin' But a She Thang" and even threw in a brief medley tribute to Old School hip-hop, which for most of the audience was anything circa 1990. Best known for their sexy videos, Salt-N-Pepa gave the ladies in the house a little holiday surprise during "Whatta Man" by bringing on nearly 30 buffed, shirtless brothers for a Chippendales-style bootyfest to close out the nearly four-hour show.

Whether WJMN can continue to bring events to the FleetCenter regularly remains to be seen. But one benefit of the show's commercial success and the lack of violent incidents is that Bostonians may once again see those R&B and even rap concerts that recently have made it no closer to town than the Providence Civic Center and the Worcester Centrum.