BLACK HOLES AND REVELATIONS

"Muse" has reached stardom, they have extensively toured and won an impressive number of awards not only in Britain but throughout Europe. They are almost top of the bill in the major summer festivals and they are really awesome on stage (I've seen them once). So, "Muse" is doing well on all front, thank you.

With the opening number, it seems to me that they try to recreate "Absolution". The intro of "Take A Bow" is somewhat similar to "Apocalypse". A great way to start an album. But I wouldn't be as positive for most of the songs of this album. The album starts very powerfully with a very good trio of songs, even if "Supermassive Black Hole" has a surprisingly funky mood.

"Soldier's Poem" is another melancholic ballads a la "Unintended" (one more). It is definitely not that side of the band I like the best and unlike "Santana" who has reproduced at least ten times the great "Samba Pa' Ti" with inspiration (maybe one blunder) , "Muse" do not succeed in doing so here. I'm as well very reluctant in applauding blindly a song like "Invisible". A bit boring (except for the last minute).

Another couple of good and vigourous numbers with "Assassin" and "Exo-Politics".

With the notioceable exception of "Absolution" which was a strong album from start to finish, "Muse" 's records were far much less interesting during the last few numbers. So, what about "Black Holes" ?

Well "City" has its ups and down. Actually the ups are there when the downs aren't. The addition of orchestration reminding some Oriental mood is not really my cup of tea. The Spanish guitar intro for "Hoodoo" is interesting, but the song takes a while to lift off; again the orchestration is a bit too much.

The longest track of this album "Knights Of Cydonia" with his house beat is a track too much for most of it. Once you have passed the long and boring intro (over two minutes ) it's getting better, but still nothing great I'm afraid. It sounds completely outdated and only the last part of the song is appealing to my ears.

Don't expect too much of the bonus track, a long instrumental intro (over a minute) leads to an average "Muse" song. But to me it sounds pretty much as a draft song, that would have needed to be polished. Rather raw material.

I quite like the remark form "Hdfish" which says that : "it is useful as a "Young people's guide to more advanced music"! I could notice this with my seventeen years-old boy who is, unfortunately for me, completely into rap & associated and who asked me my all "Muse" catalogue (as well as Placebo and the Cranberries) to copy onto his PC. At least, some good music there now.

My opinion about this album, is that we are in front of a good rock album (forget the prog here), but not a great "Muse" one. This won't affect the album sales since it will sell some two-three million copies). Three stars.

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