Music you are listening to now! ***Please post track title***

[Keane]

[Greeness]

Nostalgia.

[Adsolution]

I was going to post Present Tense, but it looks like it'll be a while until the rest of the album makes its way to YouTube. That being said, this became one of my favourite Radiohead songs - if not one of my favourite songs of all time - the very first time I heard it.

[incognito]

I think my favourite of Radiohead is Karma Police, but I haven't heard that much of them.

[Keane]

I was going to post Present Tense, but it looks like it'll be a while until the rest of the album makes its way to YouTube. That being said, this became one of my favourite Radiohead songs - if not one of my favourite songs of all time - the very first time I heard it.

Yeah the new record is pretty fucking groovy, took me a 30 bloody listens to make it click but it's shaping up to be one of my favourites now. I can't get over how much I love the strings kicking in near the end of Daydreaming.

[Master]

[Keane]

[Bzzit]

I hope a sequel comes to fruition

[Keane]

[Adsolution]

Yeah the new record is pretty fucking groovy, took me a 30 bloody listens to make it click but it's shaping up to be one of my favourites now. I can't get over how much I love the strings kicking in near the end of Daydreaming.

Ha-ha, I liked it on my first listen you square nigger.

[Fifo]

The Archies – Sugar Sugar

[Keane]

[deton24]

[Keane]

Ha-ha, I liked it on my first listen you square nigger.

I was real gutted about it too cause I thought they fucked up Identikit, which is one of my all-time-probably-best-ever-favourite tracks now.

Anyway, now that you're finally done being a massive faggot and posting with us again, I'm still interested what your opinion is on Drones.

[Bzzit]

Tears are streaming down my face. Can't believe the Guardian of Earth was taken from us

[DandyGuy]

[Adsolution]

I'm listening at Harder Better Faster Stronger of the Daft Punk

I really liked that song up until I discovered that literally the the only original thing in it was the vocals:



I actually like this way more than Daft Punk's remix.

Anyway, now that you're finally done being a massive faggot and posting with us again, I'm still interested what your opinion is on Drones.

It's definitely my favourite thing to come out since Black Holes & Revelations. I'd argue that while it can be very cheesy, it can get even edgier than BH&R, at times approaching OoS/Absolution-level edginess and intensity. I'm actually not a very big fan of the production - the autotune is atrociously obvious in many places (especially in Aftermath), it's horribly over-compressed to the point where it lacks punch and sounds like it's clipping (especially in The Handler), and the imaging is just muddy. I know this is the guy who produced ACDC, but I can't help but feel he's lost some of his touch, or maybe has trouble with modern technology (especially autotune). That being said, he still knows how to create unbelievably thick, chunky and powerful guitar tones.

Anyway, I'll do a track-by-track:


Dead Inside
I fucking love this track. From the moment I first heard that organ sweep, then accentuated by the synth pizz during the prechorus, I was like "this is epic, this is inspired, this fresh". It gets slightly more layered in the second verse/chorus, great. I was like "oshit" when the guitar came in at the bridge, and I almost facepalmed when I realised it was doing a vi-IV-I-V progression (I've ranted about that progression before - it's literally the most overused pop song progression of 2014 - think All of Me by John Legend), but I quickly stopped caring because of the fucking epic vocals that came in. Then, the final chorus… I almost got hypothermia and shat dry ice. It's one of my favourite Muse moments. Ever.

Psycho
I don't really get why it had to be over five minutes long given how repetitive it is, but it's just a fun track. Not daring in any way, but geat for live (also, I've never been one to complain about a track being too long - I wish everything was longer). I don't know anyone who doesn't enjoy it, even people who really don't like Muse.

Mercy
I cringed so hard at this song when I first heard it. It, to me, seemed as if it was trying to relive Starlight, except with a completely directionless motifs, and the lyrics are just awful. The bridge vocals literally made me laugh. While I still maintain the lyrics are awful, as "unmemorable" as I found the song, it somehow became the biggest earworm of the year for me, to the point where I actually started to like it.

Reapers
The verse to this song is okay, nothing special in my opinion. It's very reminiscent of some late-Absolution tracks like The Small Print (which everyone seems to love but is probably my least favourite on the album). That chorus guitar riff though, that is fucking phenomenal. If any fan of iconic 80's hair-rock has been feeling starved, look no further than this fucking riff. The solo too, AAAH THE SOLO, I've been DYING for some of this batshit crazy OoS-type stuff for so long. And it goes on for literally three minutes, I love it.

The Handler
This. Song. Fucking. Kicks. So. Much. Ass. When I heard the guitar riff in the intro I was like "no way, it just did that, that is so GOOD", and the song never stopped surprising me. The prechorus, again, is probably one of my favourite Muse moments (the bass line jesus). The bridge just goes all out, it's so epic, so full of energy and angst, I can't, it's just too good. The solo starts off cool, but I really think it should've evolved past just repeating the same four bars like ten times in a row. But yeah, arguably my favourite song on the album.

Defector
I don't like this song as much as other people do, but it's still good. Some of the lyrics are very plodding, and I at this point I'd gotten a little bored by most of the songs on the album so far being in drop-D, in the key of D. The solo is easily my favourite part of the song, it has a stunningly beautiful melody (and harmonic progression to go along with it) almost reminiscent of If We Hold On Together.

Revolt
This started off as my least favourite song on the album. It wasn't "memorably bad" like Mercy, it just seemed cheesy, derivative and uninspired. After quite a while of ignoring it I decided to come back and listen to it closely, and I was pleasantly surprised. It's cheesy and derivative, yes, but setting aside the composition itself, the amount of energy they put into this song is unbelievable, as are the vocal acrobatics. If this song doesn't demonstrate how Matt's only improved as a singer over time, I don't know what does.

Aftermath
Honestly, I think the production in this song before the drums come in is quite awful. The guitar tone is nice though quite boaring, the strings sound super thin, and the autotune is beyond atrocious, especially on the very first lyrics "War is all around". Perhaps it isn't noticeable to a lot of people, but as a producer myself, I know what autotune sounds like, and it's awful here. Despite all this shit I'm giving the production, the composition, especially the chorus, is very pretty. It's kind of reminiscent of Explorers (which was my favourite song on the previous album), though way more light-hearted and less intricate.

The Globalist
Ho man, this track is fucking dank. The composition itself is so evocative I can see an extremely detailed, nonexistent music video playing out in front me whenever I hear it. I love how much it takes its time throughout its various stages, and the build up to the climax is so beyond hype. This is the third time I'm saying this now - the solo is one of my favourite Muse moments, it's literally one of the most epic things I've ever heard, it's probably my favourite part of the entire album. The last section, obviously Queen-esque, is great. It's dynamic and powerful, especially when he belts out those high notes ("The greatest hunter will survive alone"/"Lost in space and time, forever more").

Drones
Heheh, there isn't much to say about this one. They created a legitimate organum, which is a mediaeval genre I studied in great detail during my advanced music history courses, and for that I can't appreciate it enough.



All in all, it's a fantastic album with the majority being really great tracks, which is way more than the regular "one great song, two pretty good songs" you would get from albums a lot of alt-rock bands typically put out. While I definitely hear their original sound (what was entirely unique to Muse, what they established in Origin of Symmetry and Absolution) shining through on multiple occasions (whereas it was almost entirely absent for the last two albums), I wouldn't consider it fiercely original enough for me to label it as one of their defining albums, but it's definitely worthy of praise. Like usual, I have literally no idea what to expect next. Matt will be 40 by then, isn't that crazy? That's a spot in my head I had reserved for Thom for so long.

[incognito]

Clinton Affair - W i n d o w s
Beautiful, that sound is so pure.

[Bzzit]

classic

[incognito]

@Ad, I like Daft Punk's version more than the original, sorry

DJ Orkidea - Radio Unity 044