Anyone who saw the condensation dripping from the ceiling among the 4,000 spectators in Wettingen 16 years ago might already have guessed what heights these three would reach. Muse's performance in the Tägersporthalle in 2003 left only one question unanswered: Where does the musical path lead?
The future is now, and Muse are one of the biggest stadium bands in the world. Their theatricality is reminiscent of Queen, the melancholy undertone of Placebo, and the energy that resonates from their live shows is only known from Bono and co. The catalog that the three Brits can draw on after eight successful albums ranges from guitar-laden rock anthems to quiet, piano-laden ballads. Whether you're a fan or not, live they wrap you around their little finger. On their Simulation Theory World Tour, the focus is on the mix of the typical Muse sound and the new synth-pop elements borrowed from the 1980s. You can hear that the album fits in with its predecessors and that it only fully unfolds live.
At the start of the Simulation Theory World Tour, drummer Dominic Howard promised that the trio would "try to do something completely different from anything we've done before" - anyone who has followed the group's concert history knows that this is a difficult undertaking. After all, the band is known for its opulent staging. Last time, for the Drones world tour in 2015 and 2016, Muse even had small boats buzzing through the arenas. On this tour, the focus goes back to flesh and blood, back to people.
"There will be more people on stage with us," Howard announces. "We're trying to bring more humanity to the show. On our last tour it was all so techy with the drones flying around and stuff - which is cool, but we want to try and move away from the big screen a bit, with lots of visuals in the background." That's why the band has decided to bring more protagonists on stage and portray humanity through performance art.
Singer and guitarist Matt Bellamy adds that, as always, visuals play a big part in
will play at the show - based on the videos that Muse created for their "Simulation Theory". "We've never produced so many videos for an album before, it was very elaborate and designed for the live show," says Bellamy. "We tried to create a visual world for this album. The videos are very continuous - we want the audience to see more than just the audible in the music. So we've taken that visual world and tried to translate it into the live show in collaboration with other artists and musicians."
Howard announces that the show, which Jesse Lee Sout and Sooner Routhier also collaborated on, "will be much brighter and more colorful. The last tour had such a dark undertone and theme. It was all very menacing, with the drones watching over everyone. The images were quite dark, so this time everything will feel a bit more alive. You can also see us as a band again, at the last shows the audience didn't get to see our faces very often as we almost disappeared into the background in the darkness and the dominant visuals. We are people too and want to show ourselves more again."
The three boys from Devon are not ugly. And we're looking forward to getting a little closer to them again on this tour.