Muse's Drones World Tour returns to the UK after nine months for the first night of the European leg at Birmingham tonight. The spectacular stage built “in the round” consists of a central round stage from which two walkways ending in platforms extend; above the stage is a 360 degree video screen and high in the ceiling are a dozen large globes.
As the house lights dim the globes light up, take off from their platform and float around the arena in a ghostly ballet to the title track of the 'Drones' album. The band who entered from the far corner of the arena emerge from under the stage to the Drill Sergeant “Your ass belongs to me now- Aye Sir”, as the chunky riff intro to 'Psycho' starts up and signals the leaping down the front. The end of 'Psycho' leads into the drums and guitarist Matt Bellamy's fretboard tapping intro to 'Reapers' as the now illuminated floor of the central stage starts rotating giving the audience a decent view regardless of where they are in the arena. The new album has a more stripped back, direct sound when compared with the previous two albums which helps highlight the big chunky guitar riffs and pounding, driving section provided by Chris Wolstenholme and Dominic Howard. The squealing feedback which ends 'Reapers' morphs into the familiar guitar riff and throbbing rhythm of 'Plug In Baby' the chorus of which results in the first big audience sing-along of the night.
During the first pause of the night as Matt welcomes the audience “Hello Birmingham, ...we're back home” to the pounding drum beats of 'Dead Inside' semi-transparent projection screens drop down above the two walkways as animation of the drone being prepared for war plays on the giant screens. This is topped by a stunning use of the technology for 'The Handler'; a sinister pair of eyes appear on the screen above the central stage and above the walkways two giant hands from which strings appear to connect to Chris and Matt controlling their movements as they play the track.
The spheres take flight, change colour and pulse, rotate and dance to accompany 'Super Massive Black Hole' and 'Starlight', during the latter track half a dozen super massive balloons are released for the crowd to play with and as each balloon approaches the stage Chris bursts it with his bass showering the front rows in confetti.
John F Kennedy's speech against political-economic- military complexes forms the intro to a brutal 'Stockholm Syndrome' with an eye-melting, migraine–causing use of the light show. 'Time Is Running Out' and 'Uprising' get more mass audience participation.
Just when you think they've used every spectacular trick in the rock arena play-book they top it all during 'The Globalist'. The whole length of the arena in now being used as a giant projection screen which shows vast cityscapes appearing and being destroyed by the drone, the heavy instrumental section is the cue for a large spaceship to take flight for a lap of the arena and for the big finish a grand piano has risen from under one end of the walkway. The main house lights dim again as the globes resume their ghostly ballet to the backdrop of a depiction of the end of the universe and the ecclesiastical 'Drones' to finish the main set to the sound of jaws hitting the floor and a standing ovation in the arena.
The three track encore starts with 'Take A Bow'; ghostly representatives of the band appear on the screens which dramatically pull back to the ceiling to the huge power-chord near the end of the track to reveal the band. 'Mercy' has a dozen canons blowing drone-shaped confetti into the air and a couple of giant party poppers exploding steamers through the confetti blizzard. All that's left is 'Knights of Cydonia', Chris plays a harmonica which he throws into the front rows, who are fist-pumping during the “la, la, la,...” introduction, and belting out the words to the chorus as they appear on the central screens as Muse play the galloping track and you remember what a great live track it is.
Whilst I understand that advances in technology have allowed what once only existed in the imagination to become reality in a live musical performance, Muse have created the most ambitious, spectacular and successful rock show I've ever seen.
Alisdair Whyte
Note picture from O2 London 3rd April 2016