During Thursday's Stein Night with Jordan Carp, students' apathy toward live music seemed appropriate and well-deserved. The local singer/songwriter took to a poorly lit stage around 9:30 p.m., performing just over an hour of uninspired acoustic tunes to a virtually empty Stein (which, sadly, looked more like a ghost town than a college pub). While it's hard to fault Carp for his lackluster performance given the sparse attendance, it's hard to imagine he'd have been any more interesting in front of a sold-out Boston Garden.Dressed stylishly in a white button-down shirt, Carp lent his raspy baritone vocals to finger-picked acoustic songs which were, at best, monotonous. Through the course of the 60-minute performance, Carp plowed through such depressing songs as "Every Passing Day," "King of the Underground" and "Torch."

"This song is about carrying on traditions," he said, while introducing "Torch." Unfortunately for Carp, his undeniable vocal talent was wasted on forgettable melodies and simplistic lyrics that compounded the singer's near-total lack of energy and charisma.

Carp excelled when he reached above-even for a fleeting instant-his usual mellow drone to hit a soulful, Bono-esque hum. If Carp changed key even once Thursday night, it was still nearly impossible to tell his songs apart from one another; even a single major chord would improve Carp's repertoire.

Despite his subdued and sub-par performance, Carp must have some potential as a performer, since his soon-to-be-released studio album features producer J.P. Bowersock, whose impressive rsum includes work with artists such as Ryan Adams and The Strokes. That Adams-one of today's most undeniably talented songwriters-has made a career out of his overly downhearted songwriting should give Carp hope for the future. And while Carp's musical future isn't entirely bleak-especially considering the current demand for melancholic solo acts-the singer certainly did not display the on-stage personality that is so necessary for a singer/songwriter to succeed within the music industry.