SAN FRANCISCO — Two veteran American bands had two-day stands in San Francisco this past weekend, both with loyal fan bases and generous back catalogs from which to draw. But only one of those groups had new material to offer. Unlike The Eagles, who leaned almost entirely on songs from their ’70s heyday, The Jayhawks had a 2020 album to support.

The Jayhawks played to a near capacity crowd Sunday at The Chapel in the city’s Mission District. But this veteran Minneapolis group made the small venue jump with its unique mixture of Americana, power pop, acoustic singer-songwriter ballads and whatever else bears any resemblance to those forms.

The unifying ingredient with all but the quietest acoustic numbers was the powerful mid-tempo slam of drummer Tim O’Reagan, which in this intimate space made the songs absolutely jump. He sped things significantly up only once, on “Dogtown Days,” one of only three featured songs from the band’s most recent album, 2020’s XOXO. O’Reagan couldn’t help but smile at that song’s crashing finale. He and Jayhawks co-founding bassist Marc Perlman form a tremendous rhythm section.

O’Reagan sings, too, of course, and he took the lead on “Dogtown Days” and his own song “Tampa to Tulsa,” and filled the vocal role of erstwhile Jayhawk Mark Olson on chestnuts like “Blue” and “Clouds.” He also took turns singing lead on parts of newer songs like XOXO’s “This Forgotten Town” and “Gonna Be a Darkness,” from 2018’s Back Roads and Abandoned Motels.

Great show by @the_jayhawks at @TheChapelSF pic.twitter.com/2DeDL3CY91

— Hurricane Larry-bob (@larrybobsf) October 25, 2021

The harmonies of O’Reagan and keyboardist Karen Grotberg are a crucial, defining element to the Jayhawks’ sound, be it on power pop tunes like “I’m Gonna Make You Love Me,” “Haywire” and “Quiet Corners and Empty Spaces,” or quieter songs like “Sound of Lies” and “All the Right Reasons,” all of which were part of Sunday’s set.

These songs and their author, band cofounder and latter-day frontman Gary Louris, are at the forefront at most Jayhawks shows, of course. Many of the songs he helped craft with Olson in the band’s late-’80s and early-’90s days, and those he’s written himself since then, are—or should be—American standards. Of those, “Smile,” “Two Hearts,” “I’d Run Away,” “Angelyne” and “Save It for a Rainy Day” made their usual appearances in the set on Sunday.

Also as usual, Louris showed off his considerable guitar chops on several songs. On this Sunday night in the city, “Waiting for the Sun” and “This Forgotten Town” featured Louris’ classic Neil-Young-inspired solos.

Those peak moments were in sharp contrast to the blissful acoustic trifecta of “Settled Down Like Rain,” “Broken Harpoon” and “Sound of Lies” in the encore.

Opening for the Jayhawks at both shows was Salt Lake City singer-songwriter Sam Burton, who performed about 30 minutes of quiet, introspective material somewhat in the mold of Nick Drake. Burton, a member of dream-pop band The Circulars, performed solo acoustic songs.

Burton won the Sunday night crowd over, especially after he thanked attendees for being quiet. He said he could hardly hear his own guitar Saturday night over talking.

“I think this was my favorite show on this tour,” he said.

Follow journalist Sam Richards at Twitter.com/samrichardsWC.