BLACK HOLES AND REVELATIONS

I remember enjoying this record when it was released and have I done my review back in 2006 then it would have definitely been a lot more cheerful. With the release of Black Holes And Revelations Muse, once again, moved from the creative to the more commercial sound, still this album actually works pretty well even though the overall sound is not completely to my liking.

Take A Bow is a great album opener incorporating almost everything I like about Muse but unfortunately there isn't any more where that came from. Instead what follows are two very accessible singles Starlight and Supermassive Black Hole that do work in their own right but definitely not something that I would want to expose myself to over any longer periods of time. The latter of the two features some truly horrible lyrics even though I shamefully find the melody to be quite catchy, meaning that the band succeed in what they were perusing here.

Map Of The Problematique and Soldier's Poem are quite charming tracks that show that all hope is not lost, just when I started to fear the worst. I'm on the fence about Invincible since Muse is really trying to accomplish something worth a while here but the dragging intro section and an amateurish guitar solo take out most of the charm for me. I remember also really liking Assassin and Exo-Politics to some extend and considered them to be hold this album afloat even though the lesser material tries so hard to sink it with the offered blandness. The tracks are a lot heavier than the rest of the material and, if anything, mark a return to the sound explored on Absolution but don't expect any Heavy Metal since it's still Muse we're talking about here!

Despite not having much against the tracks towards the end of the album like City Of Delusion and Hoodoo they just never managed to leave enough impression on me in order to become anything else than another exercise in blandness. Listening to them today I can only verify this statement even though City Of Delusion is the most experimental track of the bunch I think that the band really got carried away with the layering and forgot to make a strong melodic performance, which is what Muse is actually good at. Recently I read that Hoodoo had won Q Magazine's 2009 Lyric of the year award. My response to that is that I've never even noticed the lyrics under all of the Spanish guitar sounds. The track does sound almost like a mini-opera so there might just be something there if only I felt like exploring it more closely. I recall being completely in love with Knights Of Cydonia when I heard it for the first time but those feelings didn't last too long and ever since I saw the music video for that track it really left a bad taste in my mouth that makes itself known every time I hear this track. This is quite unfortunate since Knights Of Cydonia definitely features a few fun moments that should sound even better when played in a live setting.

Even though Black Holes And Revelations isn't really a bad album somehow I feel that the next couple of Muse albums won't have anything left for me to enjoy since this release does feature a few signs of being a transition album. In this case it seems a though Muse can only go in one direction, namely further away from the band I happened to enjoy back in the day.

***** star songs: Take A Bow (4:35) Assassin (3:31)

**** star songs: Starlight (4:03) Map Of The Problematique (4:18) Soldier's Poem (2:05) Invincible (5:00) Exo-Politics (3:53) Knights Of Cydonia (6:07)

*** star songs: Supermassive Black Hole (3:29) City Of Delusion (4:48) Hoodoo (3:43)