Black Holes and Revelations

'& our freedom's consuming itself / What we've become.' Whatever Muse is getting at, which is some sort of miserable gravity pull of Coldplay w/ the worst aspects of Radiohead, I can do w/o. This's not profound: 'Our hopes & expectations / Black holes & revelations, yeah.' At best it's hokey, a drab conceptual piece that goes w/ no mood, at worst it's a blasted resurrection of prog sensibilities that should've died out after The Wall. There's nerdy & pretentious, there's dense & vapid, & somehow Black Holes & Revelations is all four. 'Why can't we see / That when we bleed, we bleed the same?' It gets worse as it goes along, & anytime you think they've figured something out, it's ruined by space sounds, tedious drama, & Bellamy's bad singing.

Shit holes and revelations

No. Just no. Muse capitalized on what made Origin of Symmetry successful : excellent musicianship, bombastic compositions, and the voice of Bellamy. But whereas Origin of Symmetry was carefully self-restrained, making it sincere despite its self-consciousness, the leash has been loosened since Absolution, and this one was already showing worrying signs that Muse wouldn't stop their race towards a deluded sense of grandeur and epicness. And oh boy, this album is a mess. Muse, trying desperately to get out of Radiohead's shadow, pushes the overdrive pedals to the metal, washing everything in layers upon layers of effects and pitch-shifters, at time driving towards dance beats and New-wave synths, , with each song racing towards the most cathartic, explosive climax it can. It feels forced, it drags on, and it's often grating. It's a kid screaming at us to look at them. We do, not because we enjoy what they have to say, but with the faint hope that if we listen, the shrieks will stop. They won't. It never stop, for the duration of the entire tracklist. Every track tries to show a new trick, but it's something we've heard before a gazillion times, from intense guitar solos to vocal performance, from upbeat dance grooves to classical music inspirations, it's a catalog of overhead, tame ideas "enhanced" with ultramodern and slick (way too slick) production. Bellamy shrieks and wails throughout like an emo cat that just learned his parents divorced, while trying to touch on postmodern subjects such as alienation and technology, fascism and authoritarianism, paranoia and love. All subjects Radiohead also treated on Ok Computer and KidAmnesiac, in subtle and thought-provoking ways (think Paranoid Android, Fitter Happier, or any track from Kid A). Muse approach these themes with the subtlety of a middle-class edgy teen. And the worst part is that Muse never turned back from this path, despite evident qualities as musicians. It's bloated ego and "oh boy are we good musicians" all along, without any depth or substance. It's an ad : alluring on the box, but a cheap plastic imitation of something better once opened. It sucks, but it's luckily forgotten fast. On a personal note : I don't undestand why this album is listed on this site.

Please stop it with the quasi-electronica british pop!

At one point I loved "Supermassive Black Hole," but now I can only think of vampire baseball. Good baseball—bad album.

Bombastic over-produced nonsense. Very obviously the spiritual heirs to Queen AND NO THAT IS NOT A COMPLIMENT

damn cmon now. I would have been just fine going the rest of my life without listening to this. I’ve heard “Starlight” and “Knights of Cydonia” more times than I ever needed to, and I was kinda hoping there’d be a deep cut here I might like. nope. this is bad, through and through. obnoxious vocals and weak proggy schlock. confirmed that I’m a hard pass on Muse.

Trash

A weak copy of radiohead

At best a rip off Radiohead with pop ambition replacing creative ones. At worst they're wannabe U2 at their most bloated and boring. Grating vocals, unearned peaks, predictable dynamic shifts, corny electronica. Piss poor. Just some of the worst stuff the 21st century has churned out yet.

Awful!

Seemingly inspired yet uninspiring.

I'm never going to like Muse it's middle of the road rock

I tried severql times. Not my thing. Sounds likr christian music

It sounds like Radiohead with training wheels, and 10 years too late.

This is music for people who use the word "epic" way too much. Not sure what it's doing on this list

This was crap.

Yuk!

What a terrible band

Wholly underwhelming, and a painful example of the loudness wars in full effect. Bury this one, buddy's egotistical, faux-glam vocals bring me second-hand shame. See you never again.

Sounds like a full-scale, no-expenses-spared, shameless ripoff of Radiohead in the 90s. I didn't listen to the whole thing--the Thom Yorke singalike vocals are really distracting. I don't like the harmonies on Soldier's Poem, and I like any and all harmonies, usually. I just can't get around this one takeaway: Thom Yorke sings with a great deal of emotion in his voice, and that contributes to his unique style, especially on the first 3 Radiohead albums. This sounds like someone aping Yorke's singing style, with similar emotional embellishments...except the emotion is totally absent and no one gives a shit what this Muse guy is singing about.

Boring.

07/02/2026 1. take a bow - okay.... only ever heard supermassive black hole and didn't expect synths? not mad on the vocals, but it has only just started. two mins in and still not mad on the vocals. very 2000s. just got to the guitar, bit better but the synths behind are ruining it for me anyway. drums are nice. not massive about the lyrics either. sounds weirdly quiet for the volume i'm playing it at and the buildup to the end. stadium rock for hipsters. like the distortion at the end though. 2. starlight - oh my god this is where that piano riff comes from. reminding me of the nonce coldplay psa. why were singers in the 2000s so whiny??? *3. supermassive black hole - sadly already like this song but haven't listened to it in years so it may have changed. just got to the verse, not as good as i remember, but still better than the previous songs. alright. 4. map of the problematique - christ the synth is back again. still don't like the vocals. how it manages to sound so over the top but still soooo boring is insane. emo shit. overdramatic in a horrible way (fan of 60s baroque pop and melodrama movies saying this btw). drums are nice ig. 5. soldier's poem - softer. liking the beach boys-esque melodies. wilfred owens didn't die for these lyrics though. war is bad song. this is what idles lyrics sounds like to me. 6. invincible - liking the intro. just got to the drums and regretting it a bit, but i like the spacey vibe of the guitar and the keyboard? together. these lyrics are the worst thing i've ever heard before. no subtlety at all???? about two minutes in and i want to kill myself. how am i only halfway through this album??? 7. assassin - more metal influenced. do not like metal music. drums are reallly great though. admittedly liking the chorus. lyrics are shit as ever. 8. exo-politics - like the backing vocals. love the ufo effect :) just bland rock though. 9. city of delusion - bit western in this one? bass is reaaallly nice in this one. still do not like the vocals. like the trumpets. very glad this is almost over. *10. hoodoo - liking the more western vibe of these ones... guitar intro is great! would actually like this one if it was an instrumental. reaaaallly liking the slower vibe and the orchestra in the back. just got to the louder part and any sort of enjoyement has dissapated. sounds like mcr. do like the strings in the back though! 11. knights of cydonia - liking the sound effects at the start. why has this suddenly turned into a western album though?? not complaining bc i like it more lol. synths just started. anytime i like something in one of these songs, it gets replaced by the worst thing i've heard in my whole entire life. 12. glorious - liking the intro. looking forward to whatever shit will start now. bass is nice, but still generic indie rock. wish this guy would just shut up oh my god. so glad this is over. 2000s (indie) rock is officially in my bad books again. so glad i never have to listen to any of these songs again. please god can i have an enjoyable album next.

Dreadful. Utterly dreadful.

Yep, I ain't listening to this.

Punk ass Radiohead wannabes. 1.5

Eh too aggressive of an album for me. I just listened to few songs and had to skip cuz I couldn’t get through it.

“i will avenge and justify my reasons with your blood” bro ma chi sei

I thought Muse sucked shit going into this listen, and I came away still thinking that.

F no

I assume everyone who likes this album is insufferable

Dollar store Radiohead

the owl city to radiohead's postal service.

For a second, I thought I was having a good time. I can't really say I liked most of the songs on here. It started strong, but got worse and worse as the song dragged on.

As much as I've tried, Muse has never really been my vibe. Whiny and boring IMHO.

Bombastic amalgam of U2 and Queen.

Slop then, slop now, why did people ever like this?

Might get a little harsh with this review, but man. I thought this was pretty shitty. I've never cared much for Muse, so I was hoping this album would change my opinion on them as a mediocre-at-best band. Unfortunately, it only solidified it. My biggest issue with this album is that it's just bland pop masquerading as more complex rock music. Then, they make the lyrics alien and celestial to try to hide that from the listener further. It's like a movie studio turning an intricate sci-fi concept into a big budget movie. They have to remove all the interesting context and heavy ideas in order to make it appealing to the mass audience and make money. There's no actual depth or feel to it. While I don't think this was meant to be a concept album, the issues become more obvious when you compare it to some of the other sci-fi-inspired works I've had on here, namely Tarkus and 2112. I didn't love either of those albums either, but they actually committed to the ideas they wrote around. Unlike Muse here, which just turned it into something corporate and cold with dance music underneath. While I do think the Rush/ELP works lacked some soul, I don't think this BHAR had any to begin with. Yeah, that was pretty negative. But that's my take. To end with something nicer, there were a few bright spots spread throughout the album that made me think they have the ability to come up with something good and interesting. Still, this one was bad. Overall: 1.3/5

Not for me, this one.

Late one night in San Francisco, I was very drunk and battling a Russian woman in 8-ball. She was known to be one of the better players in that bar. I was terrible at pool and am even worse now, but I got lucky that night and happened to beat her on a bank shot. In one of the few unadulterated moments of glory in my life, I recall hearing Muse over the stereo. Despite my inflated sense of mastery, I still managed to come to the very sober conclusion that Muse sucks. All these years later, I have given them another chance. Maybe I was full of it back then? Too ungenerous? This album sounds like Coldplay trying desperately to be Radiohead. It's embarrassing. I'll reserve my generousness of spirit for people making authentic music. On a song-level, whatever ... but Muse amounts to a band that wants to be another band and thinks that by fortifying their unoriginal music with arpeggiated crap, maybe we won't notice that somebody wants to be Thom Yorke. We noticed!

I would rather listen to Jagged Little Pill (two stars) than listen to this again. So for consistency’s sake (and fairness to Alanis), one star it has to be

I dislike muse so much, everything about this made me dislike them even more

Damn this album is boring and bland. The songs are so slow and meandering. What is this music for? Background? Anyone paying attention is in for some boredom. 50 mins never felt so long.

This music reminds me of Smirnoff Ice. I don't know a single person that likes it yet clearly millions of people do. Where the hell are they?

Too anthemy sounding

Pass

It's like the Franz Ferdinand or Killers albums where I think I'm not going to know the songs but I know and hate them from radio. In 2006 I liked Radiohead a lot. Hearing this must have been one of the pushes to not like Radiohead so much. This music is a strip mall full of chain stores in the burbs, the sort of stuff that convinces the young the whole world is dumber & less special than it is. 1 star you shameless cowards. music: hated. (⌐■_■)

Man... what was with the 00s? Did that decade REALLY suck this badly, or did the bot that put this list together just really miss the mark? Thinking back to around that time, I recall being preoccupied rediscovering obscurities from the 80s, so I'm probably not the best judge... though, maybe I was subconsciously in survival mode shielding myself from what would have otherwise broken my will to ever listen to music again... hmm... Right then. That musing aside, back to this Muse. I had never heard, nor will I ever choose to hear again, any of these tracks. Sadly, I have to re-ask the question that's been asked all too often on this journey: was this REALLY something that needed to be heard before one died? What makes this special? It's not innovative. It's not particularly good. In fact, it's objectively quite bad. Was it just randomly selected as a token representative from what was simply a terrible year in music? Equal parts puzzling and troubling, this.

Cacophonic.

The older I get the less I like Muse. As a young teen I loved them, and by my late teens I found them to be cringe worthy. I always held onto my belief that this was their last good album, however when I saw this pop up I instantly feared that belief would be put to the test. It is pure dog shit. Absolute radio ready over polished conservative parent approved rock music. Every single lyric on this album is a vapid statement about "the man", though never going in depth enough to reveal which "man" they might be talking about. Guess Matt Bellend was smart enough to sell himself to both sides of the political spectrum and only complain when right wing people liked his music after the money was made. The synths are budget stock sounds with an absolute lack of interesting sound design, the instruments are quad-tracked and quantized beyond any semblance of human playing. Yeah this is just souless corpo rock. When Assassin started playing I thought "Oh I remember this, it gets kinda heavy right?" followed by a neat System of a Down riff and then straight back to average rock land. When we finally got the Knights of Cydonia I was relieved, the one song I thought was going to bring this album back for me, but after enduring the slog of shit proceeding it all the joy was gone and my love for that goofy prog rock banger turned into grating rage. It is bland. It is safe. It is boring. Thank fucking god we have Yank Crime next.

Who cares

Awful

Black assholes

Starlight is unbearably whiny. Supermassive Black Hole is boring. Giving up on this album, def not my thing.

shit

I hate everything about this. I just finished "invincible" and am questioning the logic of riding this wave to the shore.

The debut album from Muse was good. Everything after that was parodying glam rock. This album received so much air play in the year of release, which indicates the quality of music that year. Overall, this is quite shit.

Too many guys singing in high pitched voices. Could not complete.

If all your ideas suck, it doesn’t matter how hard you practice. Radiohead: No more rock music. Muse: *makes this* Everyone: Right, no more rock music.

Ook echt geen zin in. Misschien wel mijn meest gehate band. Laat maar zitten.

Not for me at all

Wowowow hate hate hate

I'd only heard small bits of this lot before, and from what people had said about them there must be something I'm missing. I was ready to hear something fantastic. What I got was the kaiser chefs and the killers with more whiney keyboards and vocals. I really couldn't have been more underwhelmed. There is something I'm missing, an hour of my life. The phrase that has been used on several occasions on here is "I'll give it a 1 because there isn't a zero." This is NOT true for this. They have fully earnt their 1.

Nope. There’s something completely robotic and completely unauthentic about Muse. I’ve just never been able to connect with whatever it is they are trying to achieve.

Boring. Every song sounds the same.

++: Take a Bow +: Supermassive Black Hole, Hoodoo +-: Map of the Problematique, Soldier's Poem, Knights of Cydonia -: Invincible, Assassin, City of Delusion --: Starlight, Exo-Politics 3,2/10

Oof. To maintain integrity with my 15 year old self (this album, and Aha Shake Heartbreak were the first non-60s/70s CDs I bought, as I crawled out of classic rock exclusivity), I cannot in good conscience give this 1*. Gotta go 2*, but oof, in relistening this… isn’t great. I see a conversation with a major label’s upper brass going something like this: “Man, those Radiohead nerds sell a lot of records.” “I bet we could sell even more if we polished up the spacey weirdness and made the band more handsome!” Holy, does Muse ever sound like a Radiohead cover band on this one. A closing fun fact: I saw Muse live at a major music festival. Throughout the show, they use little timed cameras on their mic stands to project their faces onto a big screen. About midway through, the bassist’s camera shifted, and whenever the camera went to him we saw up his nose. Nah you know what, screw it. 1* it is.

Not for me.

I used to like the second song

Not for me

Radiohead: The Musical!

Baby's first progressive rock album. Incredibly impressed with their own intelligence. Thom-Yorke-ripoff vocals. The prog-latin crossover missed the bus since The Mars Volta did it orders of magnitude better, but the spaghetti western stuff on Knights of Cydonia is kinda cool (until the unlistenable processed vocals kick in). The pop rock songs like Starlight remind me of more enjoyable hours I've spent listening to Coldplay but end up being the best parts of the album. I also like how the album cover looks like a drug deal scene from Breaking bad! The piece de resistance is the lyrics though. On a song ostensibly about the grandiose theme of the galaxy being sucked into a black hole, we're treated to this: "I thought I was a fool for no one But, ooh, baby, I'm a fool for you You're the queen of the superficial How long before you tell the truth?" WELL PLAYED, SIR! I F*****G LOVE SCIENCE!

bombastische luchtbel

One of the worst concept albums I’ve ever heard in my life. I was bored listening to this. The singer’s voice had no personality. If the Earth was being engulfed by a black hole and the Government was trying to cover it up, I would think a person would be more emotional and not sound disinterested.

What a load of pompous, bloated old guff.

People who were kids at the turn of the millennium who liked Rush but didn't want to be accused of just listening to what their dads liked would like Muse. Ugh.

Neat

Honestly. Fucking hate it. Emo shit.

Radiohead was too weird for commercial rock radio in the mid-2000's so they called up Muse to do a shameless impression of what Radiohead would sound like if they just kept making albums like The Bends. From the get go, I found them irritating and insincere. Not much has changed, I was very bored by it. Though, "Knights of Cydonia" gave me Guitar Hero 3 nostalgia, so there's that. The album felt entirely too long at ~50 minutes long. Not sure what Muse doing on this list.

Emo the Killers. Cool.

Bland in a way that is actively unpleasant

5 songs in: Well, so far, this album appears to be what you get when you feed the Nine Inch Nails and Andrew Lloyd Weber catalogues into ChatGPT and ask it to make you something hopeless. Complete: Ok, to me, it's almost 50 minutes of Jesus storming the temple in Superstar. It's just a lot. I wonder how much of my experience is created by the way the aids process sound. There's a lot where the soundscape just feels like a whole lot of....noise vs music. I can kind of recognize that there are layers of things happening, but all I'm actually experiencing is the aural version of when you've rinsed your paintbrush off in a cup of water with too many different colors.

Synthetic Radiohead. Just so sterile and uninteresting.

Always hated Muse, and I'm not sure why. Didn't mind Knights of Cydonia on GH3, but grew to like them less and less over the years. I've even seen them live and didn't enjoy it. I think listening to this hasn't really changed it, but I can see something of Radiohead in there? Idky I don't like it/them, but I just think it's soulless sort of bluesy rock/proggy guitars that I think is all male bravado. If Muse sorta stayed at Feeder's level of success, maybe I would respect them more - a little local band in Devon. But why they are so huge I cannot say, unless the majority of the public have a shit taste in music (they probably do). I once made a joke about Muse calling it "Matt Bellamy's [something something]" which really made me laugh at the time, but I can't remember what it was. Ah well, here's 1 star on me lol.

Shit. Would be ok if I died before I heard this rubbish. Wannabe rock band

I’m a scientist and can confirm that black holes exist. Revelations however is bible nonsense.

A-Muse-ing

Shite

Once you notice Matt Bellamy takes a massive breath in between each line, you can't unnotice it.

I know I have heard of Muse. I just could not remember the song I had heard. For EVERY song that played I thought “This is the song” because they all sound so much alike. They don’t sound bad, they are just forgettable. And I still do not remember the song I knew them from.

супермасів блек хараша щоб грати на моїі тій роботі зімість їхнього радіо а так хз простенько

how derivative can one band be?

I really don't like this band. Really annoy me. 1/5

Not good, didn’t like

No.

Ya paso ese estilo en mi vida; me gusto y ya meh

A couple of good tracks, but that's it. Sounds heavily produced. I thought I'd enjoy it, but sadly, I didn't.

One and a half decent songs

I couldn't get past the third song. No thanks.

Ich finde die ersten beiden Stücke langweilig. Liegt wohl auch daran, dass ich den Text nicht ganz verstehe...

Starlight on edelleen nostalginen ja vie yläasteen koulunpenkille, mutta eipä tätä muuten voi enää kuunnella. Oli suosikkibändi 14-vuotiaana, mutta sinne se kuuntelu ansaitusti jäi. En ymmärrä, miten tämän on voinut aikuinen kriitikko kuunnella ja todeta tärkeäksi. 1/5

unbekannt

Pompous mouth breathing bilge

Reading the Wiki page before listening I was excited and really wanted to like this album, but I couldn’t because…well … because it’s shit.

"Starlight" is a decent song, but that's where the compliments start & end. They almost had something good with "Glorious", but then the singer kicked in and it turned into scuttery crap. This shit sounds like somebody taught Andrew Lloyd Webber to add effects over electric guitars and ditch the piano for keyboards.....and also turned Tory Peer Webber into an even bigger tax-dodging, snooty douchebag. This is Operatic Posh-Boy Emo. Excruciating trash. Just listen to "Hoodoo" & "Knights of Cydonia" back-to-back and tell me those weren't written by cunts. This is music for dorks who are maintaining a firm grip on their virginity. 👎👎

L’unica stella va al gruppo, perché se fosse stato un cantautore, il cantante avrebbe preso zero

Y.A.W.N.

Yuck

Can't stand Bellamy's voice. Listened to 3 minutes 29 seconds of take a bow and quite. I'm out

Really dislike it — the vocals, the histrionics of the music that probably plays OK live, the lyrics, all of it. Blehhh…..

Didn't like it at all

Too crowded and generally noisy Just 2 Songs that are gems

Well, this album certainly tried very hard to get my attention... I suppose there is a time and place for this kind of music - but in my opinion it is not on this list.

I’m on a plane headed back from Vegas. My ears hurt. I did not like this. I’m curious if the band sees this as “deep and meaningful art”. If so, they may be the types who find a particularly interestingly (or not) laid dog turd as “art”.

God I hate muse. Didnt give it a try. His voice makes me angry

Un peu l'équivalent d'une Civic avec des néons qui passe sur Marie-Victorin

Pew pew pew pew pew

Un album pompeux avec beaucoup trop d'arrangements et un chanteur qui se force à avoir une voix langoureuse. L'intermède de style Morricone est intéressant mais complètement forcé.

This was my first time listening to a full Muse album. Over the years I've heard them compared to a weak Radiohead style band, but I could never verify. Listening through this, their "top rated" album - I hear not only Radiohead, but lesser known bands they may have aped while creating this record. Opening track "Take A Bow" sounds exactly like an shitty synthesized/alternative radio version of the tiny indie rock band Pilot Drift's album Iter Facere's opening track "Caught In My Trap" (released 2 years earlier in 2004), like markedly close in tone and build up. Elsewhere Muse takes typical hints from Radiohead (both vocally and electronically) all over this album. I also hear a lot of California band PaloAlto (who were also inspired by Radiohead - hence the name) all over this album. It all just feels artificial. Like they're really trying to sound like they belong on the radio. They are the worst parts of Radiohead and glam rock's shittiest band: Queen. No thank you. 1/10

Not my cam

I don't give two sh*ts about this album

nah

I didn't listen it with much attention but i try and i dont know, the songs just dont stook up and i dont find them musically interesting, but like its very personal like its based on my music taste and i just dont fit in it.

Day 5: Unbelievably shite. Very disappointed because I was quite excited about this one, but I really couldn't finish it. I already knew supermassive black hole was class, but the rest that I managed to listen to were either boring, annoying, or just embarrassing

Not for me

If I wanted to listen to music that sounded like this I’d listen to U2, Queen or Depeche Mode, so I put on Khruangbin & Leon Bridges' "Texas Sun" instead. 1/5

Utter dross.

I am not super familiar with Radiohead, but Muse seems like something that was just trying to ride those coattails. I don't really get the appeal at all, and frankly it's just too much.

Didn't like 1 star

Meh...

Nope

I expected to hate this, and it still somehow managed to be worse than I expected.

Boring

I didn’t like Queen the first time around. Chucking them in a blender with a bit of The Strokes and a little U2 makes me like them even less this time around.

Below par Queen. And I bloody hate Freddie Mercury as well.

Just not for me

Some groups can be expressed mathematically, as the summation of particular influences the group is more than happy to acknowledge. Beatles + Black Sabbath + Pixies = Nirvana. Orange Juice + Strokes = Franz Ferdinand. With today's band, it's Genesis + Queen + Jeff Buckley + Radiohead = Muse. I can't be the only one to feel trepidation upon seeing the first side of that equation. Each one of those acts has some fundamental aspect that may very well deter the uncommitted listener (yes, even Jeff Buckley). The result threatens to be simultaneously stuffy, affected, histrionic and cold. And the result is stuffy, affected, histrionic and cold. Muse were one of the late-90s British groups to reject Britpop, with its punky irreverence and kitchen-sink concerns, instead borrowing excessive virtuosity, conceit and tone from prog whilst leader Matt Bellamy insisted on singing every damn note in Jeff Buckley's falsetto. My fellow travellers on life's long journey, you should know by now that a rejection of punk will never win my favour. Also, Muse's resuscitation of prog does not feel inspired, but just the inevitable recycling of everything recyclable from the past. At some point, some band was going to try and bring back The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, and Muse thought it might as well be them. That paragraph didn't mention the other band, the band who has overshadowed Muse for their entire existence: Radiohead. In my review of The Bends, I discussed how The Bends accidentally invented the next decade's trend of landfill indie. Muse obviously nick plenty from Radiohead, but far more from OK Computer and Kid A. Now, I have no qualms whatsoever with such outright theft, as long as they do something with it. And to their credit, Muse do do something with their loot; unfortunately, they tend to do bad things. Black Holes and Revelations (yes, that title is wank) is the consequence of seizing upon one facet of a myriad of artists, then intensifying it to the exclusion of all other concerns. So, as stated before, Matt Bellamy's falsetto stems from Jeff Buckley's use of the falsetto. I've never been persuaded that Jeff Buckley is the greatest male singer of the 90s, but I understand that his falsetto broadened the dominant male range of the time, and was meant to extend how widely male singers could reach for. Just singing falsetto drastically misses that point, and incidentally is extremely annoying. Likewise, Muse steal Queen's theatricality, but forget to take along the camp fun Queen revelled in. The listener is put in the bizarre situation of hearing Muse attempt their own version of Peter Gabriel's Slipperman, all the while wishing that Muse would just get Phil Collins involved somewhere. And I've written before that OK Computer's student politics seem jejune nowadays, but where do Muse go with such concerns? Conspiracy theories and ancient aliens building the pyramids. The last parts would suggest that Muse have some sense of humour to lighten this broth, but this album is delivered with iron solemnity, as a deeply profound article. Even the deliberately comic bits (e.g., Knights of Cydonia) feel perfunctory when taken with the whole of the album, as if Muse just seek to avoid accusations of disappearing up their own fundament (and thus slip even further up the back passage). Okay, I admit I would have relented somewhat, in that Supermassive Black Hole has a decent, straightforward groove that redeems the album slightly, but then I took a walk. On that walk, I realised that Genesis + Queen + Jeff Buckley + Radiohead = Emo ELP. Emo ELP: Two words, five syllables, one unsalvageable album.