Funky and a-Muse-ing performance lights up park like Space Odyssey
Muse
Marlay Park, Dublin
Muse frontman Matt Bellamy dons red cat-suit and guitar for the entertainment of adoring fans as the band lights up Marlay Park in south county Dublin with 'laser' beams and sci-fi effects
Their entrance at Marlay Park is preceded by a sci-fi extravaganza that would have George Lucas breaking out in goose bumps.
As the howling score from the finale to '2001: A Space Odyssey' -- aka the mad shrieking choir part -- pumps from the speakers, four enormous (if rather plastic looking) radar dishes twitch into life, strobing the audience in red 'laser' beams. You half expect an alien mother-ship to hove into view and disgorge the band.
In fact, when Muse finally appear, it's something of a letdown: the Devon threesome simply walk from the wings, strap on their instruments and offer a matey wave.
At least front-man Matt Bellamy, had gone to the trouble of squeezing into a bright red cat-suit -- it's nice to know rock stars are still willing to look ridiculous for the benefit of their fans.
Muse in many ways hark back to the most riotous excesses of '70s stadium rock.
They kick off with 'Map of the Problematique', a synth-propelled epic that suggests Jean Michel Jarre's Oxegene 2 mind-melding with Queen: on paper it's a ridiculous mismatch, but Muse channel epic visions into surprisingly deft music.
They've also got a funky side -- during the swagger of 'Supermassive Black Hole', dancing Cylon-lookalikes high-kick it across the video screens, adding a dash of humour to what might otherwise be terminally self-serious.
Sometimes, it is true, their debt to early Radiohead is hard to ignore. Sitting behind a grand piano for 'New Born', Bellamy comes on like Thom Yorke on growth hormones.
But Muse's finest songs travel to places other musicians would never dare venture: the encore of 'Plug in Baby' and 'Knights of Cydonia' ring out like an intimation of the apocalypse.
Were the world to end tomorrow, Bellamy and company would be the perfect band to play us out.
- Ed Power
