Hat Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 I don't really follow what Matt has to say about these things, to be honest. Comments about the Drones album going back to their rock roots and the tour conceptually being their version of The Wall make me more skeptical all the time. The Rome disc definitely highlighted the poppier side of Muse from TR and T2L though. I guess it's worth noting that they tried to maximize the potential mainstream appeal for the theatrical release of the concert movie on top of the CD/DVD. Drones IS back to their rock roots though. Correct. Elements can be "low" in the mix, but saying a "mix is low" is like saying a drumset is "up" and "down" lmfao Exactly the point. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tesseract Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Drones IS back to their rock roots though. Thank you. I've given up trying to argue with people about this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Drones IS back to their rock roots though. Parts of it are, agreed. but for every Handler and Reapers on the album there's still a Mercy or an Aftermath. It probably has more straight forward rock than Resistance or 2nd Law though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hat Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Parts of it are, agreed. but for every Handler and Reapers on the album there's still a Mercy or an Aftermath. It probably has more straight forward rock than Resistance or 2nd Law though.The album wasn't about making straight forward rock though, it was about going back to Muse's roots, and doing a three-piece sound. If you read the interviews at the time, it was very clear that Muse were mostly talking about stripping away the stuff that was playback live anyway (synths, strings etc), and instead focus on being a 3-piece rock band. Mercy goes back to at least 2006 in Muse's career, possibly even earlier. And there is NOT an Aftermath for every Handler, Reapers, Psycho and Defector. There's literally only one. Dead Inside->Pretty much 3-piece pop-rock song, not very unlike stuff like TIRO. Psycho ->3-piece rock song with a riff from 1999. Mercy-> pop-rock song with a keyboard melody, similar to Starlight, even comparable to Bliss. Reapers-> Classic Muse in the veins of PIB, SS, KoC, Supremacy etc. The Handler-> Same Defector -> Once again a 3-piece rock song. Revolt -> Been compared to the songwriting of Showbiz (the album), and once again back to a 3-piece. Aftermath -> Basically Muse experimenting with the 3-piece formula (god I'm growing tired of saying 3-piece by now). The Globalist -> The one exception to the rule, but still classic Muse to the extent that it even sounds like a bland copy of the band. Drones ->Well...what can you say? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kueller Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Mercy is one of the most "Musey" songs on the album. Probably 2nd to The Handler. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 The album wasn't about making straight forward rock though, it was about going back to Muse's roots, and doing a three-piece sound. If you read the interviews at the time, it was very clear that Muse were mostly talking about stripping away the stuff that was playback live anyway (synths, strings etc), and instead focus on being a 3-piece rock band. That's what I meant by straight forward rock. Maybe we can agree to disagree with the extent to which each song reflects their intent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hat Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 That's what I meant by straight forward rock. Maybe we can agree to disagree with the extent to which each song reflects their intent. Wait, what was what you meant by straight forward rock? Becuse they did exactly what I said. They stripped back the electronics and the strings, and focused on their three main instruments. That's exactly what happened. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Wait, what was what you meant by straight forward rock? Becuse they did exactly what I said. They stripped back the electronics and the strings, and focused on their three main instruments. That's exactly what happened. Aftermath and The Globalist are hardly stripped back. Add in Drones and that's about a third of the album. Mercy and Dead Inside are pretty similar to Starlight and Madness respectively, both pretty poppy songs. Revolt is as much pop as rock to me. I'm not even criticizing the album. In fact, I like it a lot and play it often but there's only a handful of songs that really have an old-school Muse rock feel for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hat Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Like I said, that's your fault for assuming that back to basics for Muse didn't include pop. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jobby Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Aftermath and The Globalist are hardly stripped back. Add in Drones and that's about a third of the album. I'd rather not go back and listen to it again but, from what I remember, Aftermath is pretty much guitar, bass and drums with some light usage of strings? Some of the overdubs towards the end are a bit silly but I'd say the core of the song is pretty basic, certainly not much more than some stuff you'd find on Showbiz. Also, Drones is literally 1 guy recording 4 vocal tracks, surely that's the definition of 'stripped back'? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Like I said, that's your fault for assuming that back to basics for Muse didn't include pop. Once again, I'm happy to agree to disagree about interpretations and expectations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 I'd rather not go back and listen to it again but, from what I remember, Aftermath is pretty much guitar, bass and drums with some light usage of strings? Some of the overdubs towards the end are a bit silly but I'd say the core of the song is pretty basic, certainly not much more than some stuff you'd find on Showbiz. Also, Drones is literally 1 guy recording 4 vocal tracks, surely that's the definition of 'stripped back'? The orchestration at the end of Aftermath is pretty overdone. Drones may be stripped back of instruments but it involved considerable production and I wouldn't say it qualifies as a return to the classc Muse sound. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jobby Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 The orchestration at the end of Aftermath is pretty overdone. I agree, but not much more so than bits of Falling Down, Cave or Hate This And I'll Love You imo. Drones may be stripped back of instruments but it involved considerable production and I wouldn't say it qualifies as a return to the classc Muse sound. What 'considerable production' would 4 vocal tracks require? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 What 'considerable production' would 4 vocal tracks require? In the sense that it's purely a studio creation and the band didn't even try to replicate it live. For obvious reasons of course. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hat Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 You seem to be making these reasons up as you go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 You seem to be making these reasons up as you go. Do I need any reason to support the opinion that the Drones song is not a return to the stripped-back, 3-piece rock band sound of classic Muse? Ditto for the overproduced cheesefest that is the second half of Aftermath. C'mon, really. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hat Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 What IS classic Muse? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serpentsatellite Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 (edited) Once again, I'm happy to agree to disagree about interpretations and expectations. There's, literally, nothing to disagree with. Muse said "stripped back" "back to their roots of being a 3 piece band" etc. People thinking that meant "straightforward rock" or "no pop" or anything else have a very distorted view of the band, honestly. Muse has NEVER been a "straightforward rock" band. Showbiz and OoS feature songs with no guitar, piano songs, pop songs, bluesey stuff, etc. If people think there aren't "cheesy" songs on Showbiz, they're deluded. They literally meant "cut back on strings, electro, etc" and, with the exception of The Globalist that they admitted they cheated on, they did it. Yet, people insisted on believing "their roots" meant just stuff like SS, Showbiz, and what have you, and that was never, ever the entire picture. The Rolling Stone article doesn't seem to want to load, but it was that one regarding the Rome DVD, and another interview regarding R&L (and how it was going to impact future recordings - which if you remember what Matt said about The Globalist, was exactly what happened.) Anyways, he literally states that they are going to go back to things that can largely be recreated live without playback, remove electronic elements, and that they specifically didn't put stuff like SS and B&H on the Rome DVD because that represented part of where they wanted to go in the future with the band. (Maybe I should add that I find B&H to be cheesy as fuck. So, that's not a very specific description of anything.) And they did that for the vast majority of the songs. What WAS baffling and angering, especially after the festival tour, is that they decided to do the complete OPPOSITE live, and in addition to really heavily skewing towards the pop side of their catalogue (which is a completely separate issue,) they added more playback, more visuals that disconnect them from the crowds, and didn't include the very types of songs mentioned as the "future of the band" (at least until subsequent nights in Europe, but still very uneven)... and all the stuff Bellamy was specifically talking about in the article, regarding the Rome gig. Edited March 22, 2016 by SerpentSatellite Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hat Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 It is indeed ridiculous that they went into the studio with the intent to create music that wouldn't require playback live, DID so, but then relied more heavily on playback live than ever before. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serpentsatellite Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 It is indeed ridiculous that they went into the studio with the intent to create music that wouldn't require playback live, DID so, but then relied more heavily on playback live than ever before. Thinking about it gives me a migraine. And I honestly do get riled up that people bitched out fans who expected something completely different at these gigs, that we should have somehow expected what we got. Why, when Matt said multiple times that they were moving in a different direction, and proceeded to actually do so for festival gigs, when festivals are largely believed to be shittier, shorter, "casual" sets compared to their own arena gigs? The people who thought every Starlight and Madness was going to be removed were kidding themselves, but I think it was very fair to expect what the festivals got (and longer,) since that's exactly what the man himself had said was going to happen, and not 80 minutes of just pop hits and 20 minutes of playback and visual set up, and, I dunno, ball scratching, or whatever goes on in the 2 minutes it takes to start playing the next song. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 It is indeed ridiculous that they went into the studio with the intent to create music that wouldn't require playback live, DID so, but then relied more heavily on playback live than ever before. It's painfully ironic that the title track of their back-to-basics, 3-piece rock/pop band album is a heavily overdubbed track that relies on pure playback live. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hat Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 It's painfully ironic that the title track of their back-to-basics, 3-piece rock/pop band album is a heavily overdubbed track that relies on pure playback live.You didn't answer my question. But you came with another ridiculous statement. Dead Inside basically only uses playback for the "dead inside" part. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 You didn't answer my question. But you came with another ridiculous statement. Dead Inside basically only uses playback for the "dead inside" part. Dead Inside is the title track of the Drones album? Who's making ridiculous statements now? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hat Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Dead Inside is the title track of the Drones album? Who's making ridiculous statements now? Sorry about that. I clearly shouldn't be posting while I'm studying for my exam. Yes, I agree with your point. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted March 22, 2016 Share Posted March 22, 2016 Sorry about that. I clearly shouldn't be posting while I'm studying for my exam. Yes, I agree with your point. I'll happily end the discussion in agreement. Good luck with your exam. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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