MANSFIELD – Maybe it was always this way. Maybe, in another place and time, all bands played like The Who played on Monday night, with passion and promise and an unbridled urgency. The Who performed a two-hour set at the Tweeter Center for a sold-out crowd.

Roger Daltrey, Pete Townshend, and John Entwistle conjured up the spirits of their youth and cajoled them into lifting the songs and the evening into nostalgic nirvana. This is what it takes for a band to last more than 30 years. Opening with "Can't Explain," the band, backed by Zak Starkey on drums, sounded lean, looking coiled and ready to strike.

Townshend had already unleashed his patented windmill stroke of the guitar, eliciting a Pavlovian scream from the crowd, but he used the move sparingly throughout the night. Dressed in a black suit, Townshend grew more and more animated as the night progressed.

"This song is about what we thought it was to be a man when we were 17 years old," said Townshend, introducing "Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere." He later gave the floor over to Entwistle, who sang lead vocals on a song he penned called "My Wife." Daltrey seems to be at his fighting weight for this tour, looking rough and ready with jeans and an open shirt. His voice was ragged in parts, but mostly he pulled off the material with vigor.

The band culled songs from old BBC recordings, and pulling together rarities they hadn't played in nearly two decades. But they didn't ignore the classics, throwing in bits of their legendary catalog to energize the crowd.

A British band, with a name like Unamerican, playing the night before the Fourth of July, in the home of the American Revolution? Whose idea was this? Opening band Unamerican did more than just survive their 45 minute set. They actually won some converts with their inspired rock sound.

The band scored with melodic guitar salvos like "Spiritual" and "The Closer You Get."