Nigel_Tufnel Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I live in a small town and we don't even get decent reception for one modern rock station. There was one that played Muse regularly around for a while but they switched formats. Now the only chance I would ever have of hearing Muse on the radio would be the top 40 station. There's no chance that I would listen to that station for the off chance of hearing Madness or Mercy once in a while. I imagine that much of the US outside the big cities is much the same. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mozza Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I live in a small town and we don't even get decent reception for one modern rock station. There was one that played Muse regularly around for a while but they switched formats. Now the only chance I would ever have of hearing Muse on the radio would be the top 40 station. There's no chance that I would listen to that station for the off chance of hearing Madness or Mercy once in a while. I imagine that much of the US outside the big cities is much the same. Herein lies the problem. Those that hear Mercy or Madness once in a while and have more money than sense go to the gigs expecting Top 40 songs... Whereas old Muse fans tolerate the pop but would prefer to Rock. I suggest a battle royal before the gig starts. Losers have to sit through winners setlist Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I suggest a battle royal before the gig starts. Losers have to sit through winners setlist Only if Muse actually takes the stage and plays an extended version of Survival. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
forevermusic Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Yeah start the gig with Survival and such an epic battle, and then proceed from there. Only real sonic accompaniment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serpentsatellite Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 While I agree with your entire post, is it really smart business when you're seeing a decline in ticket sales, not to mention a sharp decline in enthusiasm from the crowds? If the pop "I want to hear the hits" audience has been the majority of attendees of the last two tours, and the tickets aren't selling strongly for this one, is that the audience you want to play to when statistically, the majority (fans of the singles) aren't coming back? Unfortunately, a lot of this tour kind of smacks of what I'd call "dirty" (called good, typically) business practices. The VIP was just the obvious one. I think it was interesting to see that the first of those last Canadian gigs that was announced was sold out for VIP, but the second date there were like a dozen people. Seems to strongly indicate there were a lot of people who bought GA VIP after they couldn't get ahold of it in the normal sales, and who didn't initially want to. The decline in ticket sales has been happening for a very long time, and is hardly limited to this tour; they were having trouble in some areas of the US from the minute they went to arena shows, and that was their high point in popularity. Announcing a small amount of dates in profitable (or at least in between profitable) areas caused a lot of commotion amongst their hardcore fans to travel, and announcing some of the dates randomly caused a lot of those people to buy tickets to dates they ended up not needing. And they really are selling themselves on the promise of live spectacle. That's the reason for the "just the hits" here, because they know the type of people showing up (although why they then are upset about how inactive that crowd is blows my mind.) It's like going to see Trans Siberian Orchestra for a lot of people, sadly; the songs are common enough you'll probably recognize most of them, and the show will be flashy as hell. There's a really paranoid part of me that thinks that, at the beginning of the tour, and at a few places in between, they dangle a CE or a DS just to keep the older fans coming due to that "maybe..." factor. The length is another one of those carefully calculated "how short can we get away with before the majority starts to complain." It's not limited to Muse; back when I was younger and going to concerts 90 minutes wouldn't have been tolerated, and I remember going to some gigs when my bf and I started going out and being shocked as hell that 90 minutes seemed to be about the norm for gigs now. It feels like it just became the expected thing, and sadly a lot of bands jumped on that bandwagon because it's certainly easier for them. Reminds me of when kids movies went down to that length because of "short attention spans" - and made me worry about our attention spans as adults... Maybe all those casual fans WOULD complain about longer sets being boring. :'( Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serpentsatellite Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 This isn't Muse's fault directly, but obviously cancelling gigs or announcing ones closer to home weeks later creates an issue with it... but I have to agree there seem to be some real issue with consumer rights in the area of travel and lodging. It sucks enough that the fees for rescheduling flights are rather high, (and it somehow costs $400 for a 2 hour flight, with $150 in fees,) but I'm still having major issues with hotels that I wasn't expecting. I've poured through all the fine print 10 times and there's no indications that my hotels aren't refundable or transferable, and I only put down a cheap deposit I expected to lose. However, I'm being told that "due to the time of the year and customer interest" (whatever that means) that my rooms are not refundable, and my credit card will be charged the full value if they cannot rent out the rooms after I cancel (and how the hell do I know if they lie about that or not?) And "full value" seems to be higher than what I reserved at, due to discounts. What the actual... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
White Heat Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Weren't they doing a live dvd in the US? Or that was fake? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jobby Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Weren't they doing a live dvd in the US? Or that was fake? You mean for this tour? Haven't heard anything about that, if so. There was talk of them doing a documentary style thing when touring T2L that I think was in the US but that was shortened to whatever 'The Road' was on the Rome DVD (haven't watched it in so long I can't even remember what it was). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serpentsatellite Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 There's an interview out there where Matt talks about wanting to do a DVD of this tour, for whatever that's worth. People had speculated about the US, because he said he wanted to do it in a country that they hadn't before, but that was obviously not going to work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I'm sure that they would want to capture The Wall of Hits Tour for posterity's sake. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serpentsatellite Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I'm sure that they would want to capture The Wall of Hits Tour for posterity's sake. Well, they did cut out a lot of songs on Rome, right? Probably just showcase the new songs and the ones everyone would expect to see. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nigel_Tufnel Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Well, they did cut out a lot of songs on Rome, right? Probably just showcase the new songs and the ones everyone would expect to see. They may have cut some but I recall that Rome just received a set heavy on TR and T2L. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serpentsatellite Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 They may have cut some but I recall that Rome just received a set heavy on TR and T2L. Yeah, sorry, that's what I meant; too much multitasking. They cut some songs from the DVD itself, but they gave Rome a really different setlist specifically for the recording. I do find it a bit weird to remember they were "embarrassed" by the robot, and didn't want to be "remembered" for stuff like that years later, but this tour rather one ups the spectacle, and will be remembered partially for something that was listed as the "dildrone" on setlist fm... Those poor bastards have no idea what they want from month to month. I think that's why people were speculating the new one could be recorded in the US, since we get that kind of setlist anyways, but clearly they couldn't get the props working and wouldn't have committed to doing that so early in the tour. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serpentsatellite Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Possibly interesting, btw, the "dead horse" metaphor potentially draws origins from an earlier meaning, where the "dead horse" was reference to paying for services in advance, and how the recipient would typically use the pre-payment to pay off their own debts, or on liquor or drugs, and the payer would get something unacceptable for their money, if they got anything at all. Using your money to buy a useless thing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
White Heat Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 They didn't do anything special for Rome, actually they played Dead Star at the gig right before in Torino. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serpentsatellite Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 They didn't do anything special for Rome, actually they played Dead Star at the gig right before in Torino. They played a "special" set that consisted more of the "staple" material that they wanted on the DVD, iirc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alesi08 Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Apperamtly they used Maggies Farm as intro for Dead inside at Bråvalla Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jobby Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Apperamtly they used Maggies Farm as intro for Dead inside at Bråvalla I mean...Dead Inside's in drop C so it'd work. More Maggie's Farm is always a good thing too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryanp16 Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I mean...Dead Inside's in drop C so it'd work. . I just watched the video. It really doesn't. Go to 8.21. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zj8rK1ilnAA&feature=youtu.be Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alexander DeLarge Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I just watched the video. It really doesn't. Go to 8.21. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zj8rK1ilnAA&feature=youtu.be Next time someone says one of those "make your own setlists" doesn't flow well, I'm going to link to this video. Anything goes after that lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dominic. Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Ehh I don't think it's awful. They're still separate enit? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jobby Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I just watched the video. It really doesn't. Go to 8.21. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zj8rK1ilnAA&feature=youtu.be Meh, I really don't think it's that bad tbh Pretty weak rendition of the riff though, don't think that helped. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MK333 Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I just watched the video. It really doesn't. Go to 8.21. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zj8rK1ilnAA&feature=youtu.be Not very helpful that Chris's bass has standard tuning for DI... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dominic. Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Not very helpful that Chris's bass has standard tuning for DI... Same as it is/was every time they played MOTP/Maggie's Farm? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clunge Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Matt's tone on that Maggie's Farm riff . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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