Conditions are always right for pop with Snow Patrol

"This song is for everybody," said Snow Patrol frontman Gary Lightbody , before playing "Chocolate" in concert on Wednesday. Let's hear it for truth in advertising. Like "Chasing Cars" -- the ardent, career-making tune used in last year's season finale of "Grey's Anatomy" -- "Chocolate" is high-class pop for the people: winsome enough for co eds and lovers, ambient enough for modern-rock aficionados, and packed with romantic verse that anyone in possession of a beating heart can grok.

Transparency works for the Glaswegian quintet, whose musical approach to epic emotions is both unabashed and humble. The stage backdrop resembled an enormous switchboard -- a fabulous, and perhaps unintentional, visual metaphor -- with a thousand tiny bulbs lit by Snow Patrol's button-pushing anthems. A few of the songs felt legitimately grand. "Make This Go On Forever" began as a cockeyed piano ballad and grew into a booming, beautifully layered beast. "Shut Your Eyes" mesmerized with whirring keyboards and coiled guitars until 6,400 fans heeded Lightbody's call to "shut your eyes and sing to me." A too-brief glimpse of a gutsy, edgy Snow Patrol came during "Headlights on Dark Roads," which Lightbody dedicated to the evening's nervier opening bands OK Go and Silversun Pickups , and where he nobly confessed, "For once I want to be the car crash."

Alas, Snow Patrol is the seat belt . Predictable swells and iconic hooks colored much of the 90-minute set in pale shades of Coldplay and U2. The trio of sweet, pummeling songs that closed down the show -- "You're All I Have," "Open Your Eyes," and "Hands Open" -- could have been lost tracks from any number of mainstream mid-'90s alt-rockers: the Gin Blossoms , or Better Than Ezra , or Goo Goo Dolls . Like the precursors whose influence is a bit too plain to hear, Snow Patrol brings safe, quality product to the masses. And if the music never quite achieves liftoff, it's not a problem. There's always another hit television show to get the job done.

Joan Anderman can be reached at anderman@globe.com