Messrs. Rice and Webber are talented and clever young Englishmen who command smooth lyrical and dramatic gifts….

But primarily the tone the music and words [of Jesus Christ Superstar creates] is one of forced hipness and sentimentality, that of an egregiously over-sweet rock-coated Broadway musical. There are the dramatic declamatory descending modulations when Jesus sings of understanding what power really is about, a steal from Tommy's "How can he be saved / From the eternal grave."

When Jesus rails at the polluters of the temple, his wailing ways sound more like Jimi Hendrix calling on his foxy lady than someone expressing a fine sense of moral outrage. And this is followed by a wispy, reflective passage that would have been more appropriate as a moment of the adolescent-dumb gloom Johnny Mathis might have felt after losing his latest passion.

Then there are the lyrics [such as Mary Magdalene's...