ALL CRITICISM ASIDE - THEY CAN PUT ON A SHOW.

Byline: David Kronke Staff Writer

When 'N Sync fans reach the age of the parents who dutifully escorted them to the group's concerts - including Sunday night's at Staples Center and tonight's at the Forum - they'll likely recall the pop vocal ensemble with the kitschy fondness their parents reserve for Bobby Sherman or the Partridge Family rather than the coming-of-age nostalgia they have for, say, the Beatles or Rolling Stones or the enduring respect they hold for Bob Dylan, Paul Simon or Neil Young.

Which is not to slam the current prepubescent pinups unduly. Generations have learned to shriek mindlessly at performers, be they Frank Sinatra or Elvis Presley or Michael Jackson or Duran Duran or Madonna or the Spice Girls, regardless of the substance or lack of same such artists may boast. Such heroes of fickle fans can suffer from tenuous shelf lives: My 10-year-old is long over Les Femmes Spice (as are most of their fans), and she's already written off the Backstreet Boys and Britney Spears. But my ears, still ringing from her screams, will attest that she's still a front-and-center witness for the enduring charms of 'N Sync, particularly, in her case, Lance (she's chagrined, however, that his doll looks more like the Joker from ``Batman'' than him); lead singer Justin evokes the most rapturous squeals from crowds, but my stepdaughter grouses, ``I hate him!''

Interestingly, though today's pop sensations still work with maudlin material that piles on the cliches by the metric ton, 'N Sync has managed to achieve a certain slick facility and sense of showmanship that many of the heroes of our own youth couldn't manage. The Beatles admitted they were lousy live - they couldn't hear themselves over their fans' screams - and many live albums from the early days of rock today sound clunky and indulgent (heck, even Dylan's '70s studio albums were riddled with technical mistakes).

'N Sync, on the other hand, puts on an astonishingly well-produced live show that not only wows the fans, but probably diverts the attentions of many parents - who throw over similar big bucks for bloated theatrical extravaganzas as ``Phantom of the Opera'' or ``Miss Saigon'' - from noticing the thinness of the music. At least for a while.

As if to prove that point, before the quintet took the stage Sunday night, speakers played a recording of a live Stones show that was probably around 20 years old that presented many of Mick and company's chestnuts in a surprisingly unmelodic fashion. Playing the Rolling Stones before an 'N Sync show may be a remarkable act of hubris, but it served as a fairly appropriate point-counterpoint for appreciating the evolution of the pop phenomenon.

The show - which played the Rose Bowl this summer - opens with the guys dangling high over the stage, strung up like their marionette images gracing their recent CD ``No Strings Attached.'' Laser lights; splashy indoor fireworks; a video screen that provides dreamy closeups of the guys as well as extended film segments that allow them to catch their breath after particularly vigorous dance numbers, frequent costume changes, and dopey dialogue depicting the singers' sanitary, playful interplay; are all blended cagily into the proceedings. The music is virtually a note-perfect though much louder re-creation of the recordings - which, depending on your outlook, is either a good thing or not a good thing at all.

Though many of the costumes appear to be some unholy marriage of ``Sgt. Pepper'' and Michael Jackson's ``Bad,'' the guys don doctors' jackets for ``It Makes Me Ill,'' duds festooned with dollar signs for ``Just Got Paid'' and glow-in-the-dark technogarb for ``Digital Getdown.'' Near the end of the evening, a chunk of the stage drifts into the heart of the audience as the boys croon the ballad ``This I Promise You.'' They plugged MTV and VH-1, aping ``Total Request Live'' (which wasn't really a ``request'' but a set-up for ``Tearing Up My Heart'') and even managed a timely nod to the holiday season with an a cappella version of ``O Holy Night.''

The group's choreography is simply rehashing dance moves Michael Jackson was creating 15 or more years ago, when he was wresting arena-pop spectacle from the likes of Pink Floyd and making it palatable for all ages, but it's performed with energy and something resembling precision. Some of the dancing, though, can seem a little fey for male sex symbols, even sex symbols for little girls - at one point, my 10-year-old marveled, accurately, ``They're so bouncy!''

Megahit ``Bye Bye Bye'' is the unambiguous conclusion to the concert - parents were dragging their kids to the exits before the last explosion had burst; at least we were spared the drama of wondering if they'd return for one

more number. But these are infinitely polite fellows - between-song patter was rife with thanks to the audience and ruminations on how ``blessed'' they are.

An extended series of opening acts from wanna-be's and one-hit wonders played a little like a high-tech high-school talent night, with some acts (Meredith Edwards, Spice Girls redux Dream and Lil' Bow Wow) performing over prerecorded musical tracks. Dream and Lil' Bow Wow, only on stage for about 10 minutes, still felt the need to pad their sets by conducting screaming contests.

Baha Men did bother to play their own instruments, but turned their novelty ditty ``Who Let the Dogs Out'' - which, despite its ubiquitous appearance during the World Series, will be lucky if sports teams are still playing it next spring - into a numbing eight-minute opus. The openers seemed picked exclusively on the basis of their inability to upstage the headliners, and on that level at least, they succeeded.

'N SYNC

Where: Great Western Forum, 3900 W. Manchester Ave., Inglewood.

When: 7:30 tonight.

Tickets: Sold out, though some blocks of tickets ($32 to $65) may be newly available. Call [phone].

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The guys of 'N Sync may be a prefabricated pop group, but they've proved they are far from being a mediocre one-hit wonder.