Muse - Black Holes and Revalations

I just picked up Muse’s new album (well not really new at this point exactly) the other day and got a chance to listen to it a few times.

If you’re not familiar with Muse or how they sound, you’re probably going to want to click the image there over to the Amazon page and check out some samples, because I really can’t describe them. Not that I’m good at describing music anyway, but this is one of those times where that’s epically true. The word “Different” come to mind, really. Like Radiohead crossed with some Queen thrown in. Which is a really bad comparison, but it’s all I got. Listen for yourself!

Anyway, I got turned onto the band by the members of the mikeportnoy.com forums, with Absolution, so I’m not an old school fan by any means. This also usually isn’t the kind of stuff I generally listen to (things with a cleaner production, for example)

One of the main things that the band seemed to want to do with this album is to branch out and experiment with some different sounds. Heavier rock, lighter balads, a little electronica thrown in there with “Supermassive Black Hole”, etc.The last one is the only track where the influence is very obvious and somewhat overbearing. If you only hear “Supermassive Black Hole” before purchasing, know that the rest of the CD is more in the Muse style.

My initial impressions of this CD are very positive. I like all the different angles they take on their base sound and don’t seem afraid to branch out a bit into other genres. My only complaint, if you can call it that is that the vocals on a lot of the tracks seem to kinda run together. Matthew Bellamy‘s a very technical singer with a lot of inflection and pitch changes (and all that good stuff) in his vocals, but it seems he can get in a rut at times which makes the vocal lines on every song sound pretty similar. It’s just a minor criticism though and doesn’t really detract from my enjoyment of the album. Overall, I like it more than Absolution.

Favorite tracks include “Starlight” which is a more straight ahead pop type song and “Assassin” which is probably the heaviest song on the CD. “Knights of Cydonia” also rocks. Hard.

Related posts:

1. The Music Explosion Begins!
2. QotD: Top 5 In ’06 – Music
3. Top Albums of 2009