NRBQ: Desperados, Washington DC

AFTER A quarter-century of rock 'n' roll, it should be obvious that the idiom (if it can be classed as such) must be maintained by certain forms, structures, (musical) languages, borrowings, adaptations, and alterations made to face the demands of taste and time. Few bands master a multiplicity of styles, and fewer attain this mastery with any originality, live or on records. NRBQ is exactly this kind of band, and more.