Brandeis abhors a vacuum. Case in point: On the first Sunday of the new semester, when most students had yet to unpack and even the midyears weren't fully settled in, when the weather was so cold that the ink in my notetaking pens literally froze, the school nevertheless deemed it a perfect evening to hold a concert at Cholmondley's.Indeed, the coffeehouse was packed when Boston-based singer-songwriter John Burlock and his acoustic guitar took the stage in order to play a mix of originals from his upcoming CD and covers from artists such as Matt Nathanson and John Mayer. However, as the bearded, knit cap-sporting Burlock launched into his set with a song called "Cardboard Shoes," it became clear that most spectators were present only to get out of the cold. Loud conversations were held over the music, and the polite applause in between songs was punctuated with sarcastic comments, including one (denied) request for Burlock to "play 'Singin' in the Rain!'"

Making matters worse, Burlock, as a performer, lacked the charisma to enthrall even the most silent of audiences, let alone this talkative Brandeis bunch. His voice, though strong and solid, had that nasal drone which afflicts so many alternative rockers these days. Often, it was downright insufferable. When he sang the lines "I'm walking faster/ than ever before" in the self-written "Better," he gave the words "ever before" all the harmony of a rusty nail on a chalkboard.

His set list also left much to be desired. A Spanish-language version of The Backstreet Boys' "I Want It That Way" failed to impress the jaded crowd, and a long explanation about how one song was "about spies" introduced a generic tune with the nonspecific chorus (sung in a vaguely "foreign" accent): "It's not a lot of things, it's not a lot of things."

Even when Burlock occasionally hit the mark, he would somehow manage to foul it up. The soft, gentle "Slipping Away," which got by with only a moderate number of wrong notes, was spoiled afterward by completely incoherent stage banter about how the song was so long that even "my dad gets distracted. He has ADD. [pause] He spells 'Dad' 'A-D-D.'" In addition, he seemed unable to keep a firm grip on his equipment-picks kept dropping to the floor, and a string on his guitar snapped in the middle of Nathanson's "Church Clothes," requiring a 5-minute-long, mid-performance exchange of his acoustic guitar for a spare electric one.

Burlock did recoup some of his losses near the end by playing a few surprisingly pretty songs-including "Yours Truly," a stalker's ode to his loved one ("The most true form of love is stalking someone," suggested Burlock), which in spite of (or perhaps because of) its creepy theme, put smiles on a number of faces. Still, by the time a string on his electric guitar flew off, forcing him to spend yet another five minutes fiddling around with tuners, the once-sizeable crowd had dwindled down to about 10 onlookers. The rest, it seemed, had finally decided that Burlock's performance was colder than the brutal winter night.