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Album review: Muse – The WOW! Signal
Muse throw in everything including the kitchen synth as they look to the stars for joyously uninhibited 10th album
- Words:
In August 1977, Ohio State’s Big Ear telescope picked up a 72-second-long radio transmission from deep in space, in the region of Sagittarius. It played only once, before disappearing forever. The measured intensity of the signal caused the astronomer looking at the readings, one Jerry R. Ehman, to write ‘Wow!’ in the margin of the printout.
The WOW! Signal (the album), will similarly make you wonder where the hell a lot of it came from. It also finds Muse working at an intensity all of its own. After the dystopian flourishes of 2022’s The Will Of The People, the Teignmouth trio are looking somewhere more vast and fantastical on their 10th album, with a grandness of touch and preference for sci-fi majesty that’s often beyond what you’ve ever heard from them before. Even if the cover looks like a space croissant.
Take opener The Dark Forest, a retro-futuristic Bond theme bursting with grand orchestral flourishes and arpeggiated synthesisers, and an grandiose chant not dissimilar to Ghost’s Year Zero. Which is very Muse, but what’s striking is how much fun they sound like they’re having building up these supermassive, occasionally super-ridiculous, songs.
In particular, Matt Bellamy sounds like he’s having a whale of a time, and like he's spent the past couple of years having Carpenter Brut records beamed straight into his brain, covering everything in ’80s synth, strutting away as he does. On Nightshift Superstar, it’s a full-on sci-fi disco, while the intro to Heaxgons dukes them out with a blur of Van Halen-ish fret-hammering. Big ballad Shimmering Scars, and the soft electro beats of Unravelling, meanwhile, call to mind the sonic world of Bring Me The Horizon if you look at them right.
On the more familiar rock front, Cryogen sounds like Plug In Baby’s riff knowingly played backwards with a giant grin, while The Sickness In You And I and Hush, their team up with Ellie Goulding, both sport the sort of enormous, swinging riffs that powered Victorious from The Resistance.
It’s delightfully overblown when it wants to be. But it’s never stupid. When you’re looking to the stars you need to go big. Here, Muse send out their most impressive and creative signal in a while.
Verdict: 4/5
For fans of: Queen, Carpenter Brut, My Chemical Romance
The WOW! Signal is released on June 26 via Warner.
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