What’s that band that sounds like Queen covering Marilyn Manson? It’s MUSE, of course, and tickets are still available for the three-piece’s John Paul Jones Arena. We caught up with the band’s celebrated drummer Dominic Howard earlier this month, far from his native England, in Minneapolis, where the band is still touring in support of The Resistance, which features the ubiquitous song "Uprising." (See below video).
Just as the band evokes a dystopian future world in songs like "Uprising," "Resistance" and "United States of Eurasia," its fans live in a world of their own, going so far as to create a Wiki system devoted just to MUSE minutia. (Howard’s favorite cheese is brie.) Look forward to seeing fandom in full force at JPJ tomorrow.
"Uprising" See what Howard had to say below.
MUSE play huge shows. What does the band need to play?
The main focus is on like the light show. It’s extremely ambitious. We’re in the middle of a platform that comes three and half meters above the stage, and we’re really high up on these platforms in the middle of these skyscrapers. All the towers are covered in video screen, and there’s lots of video content that’s incorporated into the show. And it’s a full on rock show.
Where do those crazy ideas come from?
We brought to the set designer, Es Devlin, which was something we haven’t done in the past. We talked about ideas, what was influential in the album, and she arranged for a bunch of pictures. It was influenced by the book 1984, which we were all reading just before making the album. It had quite an influence on a couple of the songs, especially the song "Resistance" which is almost about the love story in that book.
Was any idea too ambitious for your live show?
Initially, we were going to be right in the middle of the arena. It was just going to be one massive building that spins around in the middle of the arena and we were going up and down on the lifts. It was too much. We were going to have acrobats and shit flying around the room. It was all getting a bit Cirque du Soleil.
Muse’s Dominic Howard (left).
As a Manchester native, are you influenced by bands that come from the area?
I moved down to Devon which is in the southwest of England when I was about 4 years old, so I didn’t really feel the Manchester vibe at that time. Devon is very rural, so there’s no real music scene. We were just left up to our own devices. And that’s sort of how we evolved and made some of the music that we made.
Does that account for the element of revolt in your music?
The current album is lyrically influenced by things that have been happening around us, in current culture. So, the way we felt when we were young, we really wanted to break out of our situation down there, music was a way of doing that because we were still quite restricted. Lyrically, this album has been more influenced by things that were happening around us in the past couple of years.
Like what?
Take like "Uprising" for example. When we were actually recording the album in summer of like 2009, and there were the G20 riots going on in London, riots Greece and Germany, and just around the world. That feeling was around us at the time we were making music and had a big impact on that song, particularly.
The Resistance is the first that you did without a producer, is that right?
We didn’t actually really think that we were going to complete the whole thing by ourselves. But once we got rolling, we started doing more songs and we started finishing a couple, and then we thought, shit, I think we can actually do this. So, it was a big deal, really.
Are you going to see MUSE?
