From bombastic and extravagant compositions through to deep-thinking concepts and conspiracies which inform much of their lyrics, Muse have often married mainstream sensibilities with the scope and grandeur of prog rock. With their ever-evolving sound the Devonshire trio have always ignored the rule book in favour of new, often over-the-top ideas. From 10-minute apocalypse operas to three-part symphonies to getting their Floyd on, here are 16 moments – first presented in 2022 – in which Muse have let their progressive influences lead the way.
Butterflies & Hurricanes
Arguably the band’s most far-out single from their stratospherically successful Absolution record, Butterflies & Hurricanes contains pain and beauty in equal measure, launching off a repetitive two-note phrase. It builds and builds, orchestrations sweeping cinematically into the picture with a choir of Matt Bellamy’s wringing out courage finding lyrics. Yet its constant rise is ebbed by a leftfield, winding piano interlude, before Bellamy’s Rachmaninoff influences prompt a stunning detour as an explosive finale.
Space Dementia
"Space Dementia is the term NASA Used for what happens if you're left out in space for a long time,” Bellamy has explained. “Because if you truly conceptualise the situation of being there and looking back at Earth, it can drive you mad.”
Between spiralling piano, a punch-drunk, fuzz-lavished bassline and the singer’s near-psychotic operatics, floating in zero gravity is that sense of madness. The 20th anniversary remix heightening its tension with weeping strings. Enormous, crushing guitars come in for an outro designed to be a stark contrast from its earlier section, as they drag you towards an ominous conclusion.
Animals
The 2nd Law is arguably Muse’s most experimental album. A melting pot of so many influences, Queen and Floyd-isms are bedfellows with dubstep, classical, jazz and more across what are very ambitious reinterpretations of the band’s blueprint. Animals packs a lot into its short run. The band flit between time signatures for its dizzying conclusion, which segues from ethereal Floyd to a gorgeous guitar solo and a crunching prog rock riff that, just for a moment, drops into a head bobbing 4/4.
City Of Delusion
2006’s chart topping Black Holes & Revelations is best known for Supermassive Black Hole, Starlight and frequent set-closer Knights of Cydonia – which leaves City Of Delusion something of a hidden gem. Ricocheting off an Eastern-styled chord progression and slowly building strings, its theatrics are amassed a winding structure iced with a dance-worthy yet sullen trumpet solo.
The Globalist
A sequel to fan-favourite Citizen Erased from Origin Of Symmetry, and clocking in at just over 10 minutes, this apocalypse opera is full of complexities and Easter eggs. During the song, which is takes in whistled melodies, slide guitars and a monolithic, seven-string guitar riff fest, the protagonist discovers a code which starts World War Three. That code consists of lines from the record’s previous seven tracks played backwards, with ideas inspired by Edward Elgar’s Enigma Variations dotted throughout the song.
Exogenesis Symphony
Resistance may be one of Muse’s more underwhelming albums, but that doesn’t mean it’s bereft of magical prog moments. Closed out by this awe-inspiring three-part symphony, it’s inspired by the concept of pansmeria, in which humanity’s last hopes of survival are pinned on astronauts finding a new planet to become home. As early as 2008, Bellamy had hinted at a “15 minute space rock solo” – and he delivered with a stirring suite inspired as much by Radiohead as Chopin and Strauss.
Take A Bow
The dark, unsettled opening track from Black Holes… represents a lot of Muse’s strengths in one snapshot: we have atypical structure, a defiant anti-corruption messaging and a piece of sheer scale. Described by Bellamy as a “gothic fairytale,” it lacks a definitive verse or chorus; instead it’s driven by arpeggiated keyboard phrases that perpetually change keys downwards, getting even darker and even more settled with each loop.
“Its structure is mathematical,” bassist Chris Wolstenhome explained. “Dom’s never played like that, with very jazzy rhythms, slow ones, followed by more chaotic bits integrated into the whole.”
Survival
The official anthem of the London 2012 Olympic Games and penned especially for the world’s biggest sporting event, it’s befittingly gigantean. It started as a planned collaboration with Elton John (which was ultimately fruitless) before Bellamy turned it into a gladiatorial powerhouse. Whilst the song polarised fans – and its lyrics are guilty of being a little cheesy – musically, it’s an adventurous, perpetually progressing piece that feels like climbing a mountain, sword in hand and fuelled by a lust for glory, with all the pomp and majesty prog can muster.
The Gallery
On The Gallery, Muse step away from the security of their well used tropes for something completely different. A stripped back instrumental which interweaves jazzy drum work and eerie theremin textures makes this Origin… era B-side compellingly hypnotic.
Knights Of Cydonia
This intergalactic spaghetti western extravaganza unites sci-fi imaginings with a blend of Ennio Morricone and Dick Dale; but the track also pays homage to Bellamy’s father. The laser-like tremolo riffing and galloping rhythms are a tip of the hat to The Tornados’ hit Telestar, on which George Bellamy played guitar.
Its title is inspired by a region of Mars that’s piqued many astronomers’ interest due to its face-like mountain which is believed to have once stood next to a giant Martian lake. The song’s huge success comes in the spite of being through-composed, meaning it lacks any clear repeating sections. Instead, it keeps thundering through the kind of grandiose astral plains that only Muse could create.
Verona
On the other extreme of their sound, there’s more than a whiff of Marillion to one of Will Of The People’s other prog-tinted highlight. Here, the band leans into an ‘80s era dominated by synth-addicted proggers like Peter Gabriel and the aforementioned prog veterans. Verona feels like the band’s love letter to them, with perhaps a slight nod to dark synths of Stranger Things and a not-so-subtle channelling of the Edge – a part that was tracked on Jeff Buckley’s Telecaster no less. It’s very much a brooding stadium rock anthem, but that slight whiff of prog gives it an interesting edge.
Thought of Contagion
Simulation Theory might not have been an instant classic – although Bellamy’s oddball Prince impression on Break It To Me did raise eyebrows in the right way - Thought Contagion felt like the band that first captured hearts in the early ‘00s.
Led by a darkly delicious descending bassline, it once more hits that perfect balance between a mass appeal and extravagant ambition. The song takes in trap beats, gang vocals, seismic space rock crescendos and screaming theremin – why ever not?! It’s as catchy as it is daft, as infectious as it is deceitfully wonky and fuelled, as ever, by macro-thinking lyrics that ponder Richard Dawkins writings on how thoughts can spread like a virus. Glorious.
Map Of The Problematique
A song originally written on synthesizers and finding Bellamy infusing a love for Depeche Mode with an almost Kraftwerk-like oddities, the dark song, inspired by a think-thank's map of future global challenges, exhibits the band's forward-thinking soundscaping at its finest. By blending his guitars with a freakish cocktail of distortion, flangers, and pitch shifting – techniques now commonplace in modern metal – mutates the instrument's sound to create something uncanny.
The result is achieved by Bellamy splitting the guitar's signal into three, each warped with different flavours of effects for a wild, warping sound that to this day is something of a sonic outlier in the band's ever-evolving catalogue.
The 2nd Law
When Muse went to see electronic artist Skrillex play in Camden in late 2011, bassist Chris Wolstenholme made a startling revolution.
“We went ‘Fuck, it's so heavy,’” he tells the NME. “I hadn't seen a reaction like that to electronic music before. The mosh pit has moved from guitars and gone towards the laptop.”
But Muse wanted to challenge that, recreating dub-step’s digitized heaviness on real (albeit effects-laden) instruments; Bellamy going ham on the Kaoss synth pad he’s built into his signature Manson guitar while Wolstenholme’s processed vocals warn of the dangers of global warming.
The second half, Isolated System, is a far calmer affair, baroque strings and choirs synthesizing with a cyclical guitar line but by no means drama free. It’s a two-part track that’s a melting pot of hundreds of years of music funnelled through Muse’s unique sonic lens. It’s quite the ride.
Eternally Missed
B-sides aren’t always tracks cast aside from albums they weren’t strong enough for, and often with Muse, they can show little consideration for mainstream success, instead reprsentign a more unfiltered writing approach. Heading to the studio to record Absolution, Bellamy had deemed Eternally Missed - paired with Hysteria - one of their strongest tracks. It was cut from the record somewhere along the way, but that might be because of how out-there the six-munter rager proved to be.
It goes through the motions – a creepy music box refrain clashing with Bellamy's vocoder-twisted voice before a stomping, rhythmic riff punctuates its second verse as the song continues to build and build. Its chorus feels like quintessential muse, its large scope and sci-fi pomp undeniable, while there's time for a skin-grating fuzz solo and jazzy, Radiohead-inspired turns that twinkle with reverse guitars and cascading pianos. Not to mention the nightmarish final 30 seconds as Bellamy's voice and the music box appear to sink to the depths of hell.
Honourable mentions go to MK Ultra, a prog epic disguised as a stadium rock tune, the trippy space rock of Glorious, and Megolomania’s arresting art-rock organ which explodes with organs and towering pianos in its latter stages. It’s a song that could shatter planets.
