‘Will Of The People’ – a terrifying vision of right-wing revolt eviscerating the Capitol coup crew – sets the insurgent tone, ‘Psycho’ gets introduced by an evil android sergeant major and ‘Hysteria’ zooms by so supersonically that Tom Cruise might well be at the controls. With the band often careening along a gigantic ego ramp to play in the thick of the crowd, a chunk of gritty future glam opens proceedings. Muse live in Den Haag, June 2023 (Picture: Hans-Peter van Velthoven / Press) “We’ve never seen anything like this,” Bellamy says, peering out across 67,000 people crammed into The Hague’s Malieveld park, and The Hague – in return – has never seen a rock show this ferocious and compulsive. In some territories, they’re bigger than ever. The world had, somewhat terrifyingly, caught up with Muse, making them more musically and thematically relevant than ever. What do they want? Gristly melodic space rock, Trumpian satire, anti-authoritarian rhetoric and a massive metal glove that makers noises! Where do they want it? In an apocalyptic desert futurescape, thanks!įollowing the ‘80s retrovision of 2018’s ‘Simulation Theory’, Muse’s latest album ‘Will Of The People’ both brilliantly consolidated their 25-year journey and saw their long-standing concerns – global catastrophe, technological horrors of war and thought control, rising authoritarianism, the encroaching death of democracy – collide head-on with the now. Its message: the Will Of The People must be obeyed. As Muse don their geometric metal masks like a battalion of rebel guards from Squid Game, the wall of lights at the back of the stage draws back and the 50-foot face of an overseer emerges amid the flames, his huge mask becoming transparent so we can see the skeletal images, kaleidoscopic fractals and shapeshifting T-1000 videos of Matt Bellamy’s face lurking beneath. The revolution, finally, has a figurehead.
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