Reuters Roger Daltrey, left, and Pete Townshend embrace before the concert

MYUNG J. CHUN / Los Angeles Times Matt Stephan, 14, of Simi Valley wears a tribute to John Entwistle, founding bassist of the Who. The band opened its latest tour at the Hollywood Bowl less than a week after Entwistle died unexpectedly.

The Who: Tour Opens With a Powerful Concert Continued from F1 just don’t expect from a veteran singer at this stage of his career.

Over the course of more than two hours, though, it appeared that the Who’s idea of paying tribute was to hunker down and plunge in and see what happened. There were no shrines at stage left, no performances of any of Entwistle’s compositions, but the capacity crowd got its share of mood swings and openhearted acknowledgments, beginning with an embrace between longtime sparring partners Daltrey and Townshend before a note was played. The night ended with a montage of Entwistle photos on the video screens.

“Tonight we play for John Entwistle,” Daltrey said early in the show. “He was the true spirit of rock ’n’ roll, and he lives on in all the music we play.”

A little later, Townshend, perhaps sensing that the show had taken on a business-as-usual tone, stepped forward and addressed the audience. “This is gonna be very difficult,” he said. “We understand. We’re not pretending that nothing’s happened.”

That probably made it easier for the band and audience to relax into moments of humor, including Townshend’s jokes about the fragrance wafting from the crowd and his sudden discovery of the acoustical globes hanging inside the Bowl’s band shell.

Daltrey also thanked Palladino, saying that the musician “rescued us in the nick of time.”

True enough, the music stayed impressively on track considering that there had been only two days of rehearsal. Drummer Zak Starkey, Pete’s brother Simon Townshend on rhythm guitar and backing vocals and longtime keyboard accompanist John “Rabbit” Bundrick complete the lineup.

Palladino, a veteran session and touring musician who has played with such artists as Eric Clapton as well as on Townshend albums and solo tours, negotiated the Who’s often complex structures with a determined steadiness. He avoided Entwistle’s ornate designs for the most part, and he seemed to have the audience on his side from the start, earning a cheer for his stab at the famous bass solo in “My Generation.”

At the end, it all amounted to an intersection of real life, art, entertainment and big business that’s rare these days. Those were the elements that swirled around the Who in its turbulent origins, and it’s strangely appropriate that Entwistle’s loss brought them back again, even if only for a night.