Jeff Beck Shifts Masterfully Into High Gear

The fans came to watch him play, and that’s what Jeff Beck did. The British guitar god didn’t have to speak, let alone sing, during his nearly two-hour Universal Amphitheatre concert on Saturday, because his instrumental voice came through loud and clear.

The youthful 54-year-old rocker offered a few older classics, such as “Freeway Jam,” but emphasized his engagement with fresh pop developments by highlighting material from his techno-fueled new collection, “Who Else!”

Backed by a trio from that album, he wheeled with reckless verve and astonishing precision through such revved-up, electronica-flavored numbers as “What Mama Said,” then effortlessly soared into the ether with such airy melodies as “Angel (Footsteps).”

Despite the volume and crunch of Beck’s melting-pot boogies and soulful blues tunes, the performance was distinctly jazz-like, not just in its generous helping of skittering electronic textures, but also in its focus on musicianship.

Still, listeners didn’t need to be music-school graduates to know where Beck was coming from. As much as he posed and preened like the guitar master he is, such nakedly passionate moments as an alternately thunderous and lyrical take on the Beatles’ “A Day in the Life” were so genuinely emotional, one could swear that guitar was actually singing.