21Six.net

Good afternoon, readers of 21six (all… three or four of you). I am Mr. Black, the drug-addled and possibly homicidal excuse for a music blogger and the newest member of the 21six Team (it’s like Team Rocket, only without the Meowth). My time here is mostly going to be spent on album reviews, but I’ll probably make posts on a bunch of other mostly-music-related subjects…

…but all in good time. Let’s get down to business, shall we?

THE RESISTANCE
The first album up for review is the newest offering from Teignmouth, UK’s number one collection of prog/gloom rockers Muse. The long-awaited follow-up to 2006’s iconic Black Holes & Revelations, Muse’s The Resistance has arrived to a storm of hype, a viral internet game, a tour with U2, and a gnashing of teeth by those nice people at Pitchfork waiting desperately to chew Matthew Bellamy to pieces. But aside from all of that, how does The Resistance stack up as an album? Well.

The short answer is stupid, overblown and pretentious and most importantly, stupid. But if you’re a fanboy, you probably want the long answer.

I’ve probably listened to this album more times than I care to admit, but that’s not due to any kind of real enjoyment that comes from the experience; it just makes good background music for killing the shit out of mobs in Guild Wars. In fact, that’s probably what the majority of this album could be described as: soundtrack music.

The LP opens up with the Blondie/Dr. Who shout-along “Uprising,” with a hint of Marilyn Manson’s “Personal Jesus” cover thrown in for a bit of extra bite. There is nothing inherently wrong with any of this, and while the track is nothing spectacular, it does give a strong opening hook for the album to play from. Plus, who doesn’t love a good faux-punk shout-along track on a swing beat?

Once we get to the titular “Resistance,” though, the whole thing starts to fall apart. Between the turgid U2-isms, the idiotic, overwrought 1984 lyrics, and a chorus that drags on for just a bit too long, Resistance quickly murders any momentum Uprising built beforehand. The album limps from there through “Undisclosed Desires,” a clear attempt to re-capture the R&B syncopated glory of Black Holes & Revelations’ “Supermassive Black Hole,” only without the cutting riffs that made the latter such a pleasure to listen to. From there we get to the viral marketing ploy/Queen tribute/Oh-God-Bellamy-put-the-fucking-tinfoil-hat-down anthem “United States of Eurasia (+ Collateral Damage).”

And the worst part about this overwrought, unapologetic orchestral-rock-opera-the-government-is-coming-to-destroy-you-and-murd er-your-children mess? It’s probably the best track on the album. Queen comparisons go here.

After that comes “Guiding Light,” which is basically Bellamy masturbating onto recording tape with his synthesizer while trying to pull off his best Vangelis impression. At this point I’m convinced Muse would be a pretty good hair metal band.

Things finally pick up again with “Unnatural Selection,” a straight-up rocker that confirms that Muse have finally stopped ripping Radiohead off and taken to ripping themselves off instead (see also: “New Born”). Despite the copy-paste riff, the bland vocals and the bizarre organ opening, the song itself does have a few good hooks and can make a fun listen, if you don’t take it very seriously. “MK Ultra,” aside from having one of the best song titles ever, does have a certain Dream Theater-esque charm, though by this point the lyrics have already gone back to the Alex Jones News Story of the Week in thematic terms.

If by this point you haven’t given up on this album or were too busy merc’ing the Lich in Hell’s Precipice to Guiding Light, there’s one more song and a final, exhausting run through a three-piece “symphony” that closes the album in a bugged-out, new-prog space-rock (?) mess. First comes the sleazy “I Belong To You,” perhaps one of the more creative songs on the album, complete with an ill-advised clarinet solo (seriously?), a ballad-y, unholy attempt by Bellamy to sing in French, and some less-than-stellar piano acrobatics.

Then comes the Final Boss of the album, Exogenesis: Symphony.

The first part isn’t bad. After some sweet string melodies, followed by Phillip Glass-esque scales, the song finally introduces itself with some space-y guitar work and undeniably vapid lyrics (“Who are we? What are we? Why are we?”). It’s theatrical bordering on the maudlin. Again, this is something enjoyable to listen to if you don’t take it very seriously.

The second part banishes the oh-so-pretty strings in favour of Bellamy’s desire to show off his Rachmaninoff-esque piano noodling. Only instead of adding any flavour of technical virtuoso to the track, it comes off as completely directionless. Then there’s some epic opera rock about spreading codes to stars, but by this point I’ve become so inundated to this kind of bullshit that I’ve just given up trying to make sense of this album.

Finally comes a Chopin/Liszt-style piano piece about forgiveness and starting over. Saccharine and mostly forgettable.

So, towards the end of the review I was working out a long-winded essay on why I’ve been a Muse fan all of these years, but after enduring this album (and writing this review) it’s not hard to say that I’ve found my ‘Guiding Light,’ which is telling me to never spend money on a Muse album again.

I rate this album one poorly-written libretto out of five.