Hysteria

My summer of great live music continued this weekend, with a trip to the 65,000 capacity Milton Keynes Bowl to see Muse.

I’ve been a fan of the globetrotting Devon trio for many years, but until now have been put off going to see them live by the fact they only ever play enormous venues. However, with the current Will of the People Tour and album being another massive critical and commercial success, I decided that this was going to be the only way I would ever see them play. So, last autumn I took the plunge and decided to join the Ticketmaster online queue to buy tickets.

Muse are known for putting on a spectacular live show, and this one lived up to those expectations. The stage production was dramatic, exciting and high quality, with burning fire on stage, streamers and confetti spraying out over the arena, and searchlights beaming across the night sky.

Huge screens relay scenes from the band’s own post-apocalyptic science fiction movie, in which masked and hooded freedom fighters rebel against a towering, horned tyrant. The backdrop to the stage is a huge, animated model of one such fighter, the mask of which acts as a prism through which constantly changing lights and colours are emitted. The band members are intense and energetic, and the whole production high octane.

Ironically, I read a recent interview with singer/guitarist Matt Bellamy, in which he said the band had decided to make their current stage show less complicated than previous tours!

While the stage show is amazing to watch, it is ultimately the music that counts, and the band were on top form. They played for 2 hours and featured tracks from right across their career, from early songs like Plug-In Baby and Hysteria, to new songs from Will of the People. I’m pleased to say they took in lots of my favourite tracks, such as Starlight, Supermassive Black Hole, Undisclosed Desires, Madness and Psycho.

I have only ever been to Milton Keynes twice before, and each time to see a concert at the Bowl. The first time was David Bowie on his Serious Moonlight Tour, and the second time for Simple Minds on their Once Upon a Time tour. Both of those were quite a while ago, so it is good to see that the Bowl is once again hosting top quality bands like Muse.

It is something of a trek for me to get to Milton Keynes and back, but I am really glad I made the effort on this occasion. Next up on my exciting summer of live music will be Billy Joel in London.

Wow! A few days’ rest and recovery are in order, and I’ll be back at the weekend with some food-related stuff. In the meantime, here are Muse at their hi-energy best, with Hysteria.