Gig Review: Muse at Manchester Academy, 22nd March 2015

At 10am, after a few detours and a bit of misdirection, we stumble onto the pavement at Manchester Academy, a venue holding less than 2,000 people. Me and my mate have been to a Muse gig before, so we’re slightly shocked when there’s already a queue of around 25 people ahead of us, with a couple of tents heading the line.

The following nine hours of waiting, using the toilets at McDonalds without buying anything, and offering sausage rolls to other queue-goers in an attempt to make friends, was an emotional roller-coaster; queue-jumpers received their comeuppance, people cried at the stage door, and questionable characters went around sternly demanding for entry, although the event had no physical tickets.

So, in the final hour of waiting, people began to get very defensive of their position in the queue, although this was understandable. Given that pre-sale tickets made up a good percent of the capacity crowd, these were the very dedicated fans who were present. These were the types that would scrap over a drumstick in a vain attempt to, one day, clone Dom Howard from it. You always had slight paranoia that someone was pushing in. You worried over how close you’d be to the stage. One fan, who I met while waiting to use the facilities at McDonalds, assured me that the set, and view, would be spectacular. I should’ve been a bit more confident, I mean, this guy had been to every date on the tour so far; but I still had my doubts.

Despite my doubts, I didn’t expect the crowd of crushing fans to miss out some opportune moments of moshing and dancing to a stellar setlist, an idea which seems more peculiar when you consider how well everyone knew the songs, and how lucky they were to hear the songs which were played. Obviously, new, more complicated songs like ‘Dead Inside’ can’t be danced to immediately, and at least everyone got behind the fairly basic riff of ‘Psycho’. Although, it was fairly amusing watching everyone attempt to shout “Drones!”, in time with the chorus of the new track ‘Reapers’.

But before that, there was another hour of passive-aggressive nudging as people jostled to get an inch closer to the stage. Chants of “Come on, Morgan!”, (the live keyboard and synth player for the three-piece), had started, admittedly by myself. Eventually, a quick warm-up from the Marmozets came to tide the crowd over. However, this set did suffer from the same issues I’d previously experienced at Royal Blood’s gig in Sheffield; no-one knew any of the support act’s songs. Hence, despite a lively performance, the best I and the rest of the crowd could offer was the occasional bit of head-bobbing.

Then the main performance arrived as the lights dimmed and everyone simultaneously screamed, and I’m still surprised about how many fans seemed to miss out. ‘Bliss’ was played early on, to roaring chants alongside the first few notes. Appropriate synchronised jumping then ensued, until the verse, which I can understand. Yet, even with the much-loved ‘Hullaballoons’ reminding fans of a previous early tour, and a cracking extended outro which followed the same rhythm as the intro, there was little actual movement from the crowd. There was always someone who thought that they could match and/or top Matt Bellamy’s falsetto, which resulted in an out-of-time scream equivalent to a banshee caught in a bear trap.

Sometimes it felt like the two of us were the only ones expressing our enthusiasm while we were surrounded by Manchester’s terracotta army, and while this clearly wasn’t the case, I must say that at moments, the crowd didn’t exactly do rare performances of ‘Dead Star’, ‘Fury’ and ‘Hyper Music’ any justice.

Apart from being a tad disheartening, this reaction didn’t affect the performance of the band. The cheesy segments of ‘Psycho’ including a Full Metal Jacket-esque Drill Sergeant had been thankfully removed, (or they were inaudible over everyone’s cheering), leaving the catchy riff behind for everyone to jump to. It was, unfortunately, one of the few songs that everyone got into, a flaw which even the mighty finisher ‘Knights of Cydonia’ couldn’t resolve.

I may have slated the crowd and dedicated fans for their performance on the evening, but there were some redeeming factors. During the Marmozets’ set, a group of people who’d previously attempted to queue jump were going mad. And I mean properly mad, moshing to songs which no-one else knew, attempting to start a conflict despite being given space by those around them.

The aforementioned undesirable bunch were put in their place once Muse came on, and the actual crushing and jumping began. They were shown as much respect as they previously gave, and by the end of the main set, two of them were dragged over the barrier; one for passing out, the other for being unnecessarily violent. There’s always someone who thinks they’re the centre of attention, but when surrounded by 1,800 other people who want your place, it’s probably not the best of ideas to act up.


Long story short, the gig as a whole was pretty top, for lack of a better word. Exceptions to this statement are few and far between, but here’s what I can remember: ‘The Groove’ was introduced as Matt’s favourite song from the album Absolution and all of its B-Sides. But the band had previously hinted at another track from the same period. Subsequently, fan-favourite ‘Fury’ was expected, but ‘The Groove’ was played instead, and played in a lower key, just as many older tracks are, (I mean, Bellamy isn’t 20 anymore), and the outro was slightly messed-up, as another chorus was expected. In addition, tracks like ‘Starlight’ seemed a bit out-of-place, and some of the regular material such as ‘Supermassive Black Hole’ were nothing special, but overall the gig was great. If I’ve resorted to nit-picking at how songs are introduced, you can probably get an idea of how the band performed.

In 2012, I went to the LG Arena in Birmingham, on Muse’s The 2nd Law tour, and all in all that gig was average. If you went to the gig as a fan of rock, not as a fan of Muse, it would’ve been a cracking, head-banging show. For those who could really appreciate the rarities which were played, it was almost fantastic. The gig was a real treat for fans, and while I was a bit sceptical of Bellamy proclaiming that Manchester had been “the best crowd so far” on the small tour, with the set they played and the atmosphere which accompanied it, it’s easy to see why.
My mate and I joked about this new album being Muse’s “new emo phase”, as the trio wore matching outfits and bassist Chris Wolstenholme seemed to be sporting a fringe which would look at home on Tobey Maguire’s head in Spider-Man 3, but if this ‘phase’ results in the likes of ‘Psycho’ and ‘Reapers’, then let’s get the face paint, eyeliner and issues of Kerrang! at the ready…
After support from the Marmozets, Muse played 15 songs, (the Interlude to ‘Hysteria’ doesn’t count), and a bunch of great intros and outros, consisting of:

• Psycho
• The Groove
• Bliss
• Dead Star
• Time Is Running Out
• Hysteria
• Stockholm Syndrome
• Hyper Music
• Starlight
• Supermassive Black Hole
• Uprising
• Reapers

Encore:

• Fury
• Plug In Baby
• Knights of Cydonia

Album Review: Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds - Chasing Yesterday

It’s hard for an artist, especially one as critically acclaimed as Noel Gallagher, to separate themselves from their past. Both of the Gallagher brothers have attempted it, but it seems only one has succeeded. That being said, I challenge you to find a review or impressions piece on Chasing Yesterday which is free of talk regarding Oasis, I can tell you that this article certainly won’t be.

Despite resorting back to the odd piece of older material, Chasing Yesterday is a clear step away from his work in Oasis, and Noel’s first solo album released four years ago. Noel manages to make old ideas sound fresh and innovative in 2015, and we're talking almost 20 year-old ideas here. With a variety of songs ranging from easy-listening pop beats to classic rock, it’s easy to see why the latest work is a step away from the past, and a pretty good, arguably necessary, change to Noel’s previous work.

However, it’s not a complete change. Riffs and melodies may have changed from the instantly recognisable likes of ‘If I Had a Gun…’, which almost immediately made Oasis fans trip back to the nostalgic memories of hearing ‘Wonderwall’ for the first time, but Noel’s new tunes remain catchy after the nth listen, and they certainly do become the air-punching ballads that we’ve been promised after only a few instances.

Tracks are certainly new, but not a step into obscurity; it’s an appropriate change which seems to hit the fine line between experimentation and expectation.

That being said, Chasing Yesterday is chock-full of charm. It’s an album which needs to be listened through from start to finish, not necessarily for the narrative it tells, or the sequence of songs, but for how each song bleeds into each other. Sometimes you’ll get a bit of synth which transitions from one song to another, like between ‘The Girl With X-Ray Eyes’ and ‘Lock All The Doors’, (which are arguably two of the stronger tracks on the album), and you’ve still got all the count-ins and snippets of communication between the band at the beginnings and ends of songs which fans will love.

While the new stuff isn’t exactly the raw, swagger-inducing rock which preceded it in the 90s, Noel’s stuff does have some trace elements of rock, and even though some of the better tunes stem from that nostalgic period, (the ideas behind ‘Lock All The Doors’ are at least 20 years old, and ‘The Dying Of The Light’ has been floating around, being played during sound-checks for a few years), their lengthy development certainly shouldn’t be held against them.

His solo work does seem a lot more relaxed in comparison to his previous endeavours, and that trait is continued here. Chilled songs vary in their catchiness, and tend to be a tad more forgettable, but at the very least their atmosphere will make you relaxed enough to endure. To give the man further credit, he knows how to pick out his singles, and I’d sincerely hope that ‘Lock All The Doors’ is next in line to receive the standalone treatment, it really does embody the anthems that Noel was apparently trying to create.

As someone who’s distanced himself from the likes of Elbow and The Verve in recent years, maybe I’m just not as fond of more relaxed music, although this wasn’t an issue with Noel’s last album. In order to try and stagger towards some kind of conclusion, I’ll attempt to be somewhat statistical about this. On Chasing Yesterday, there are six songs which became the catchy, sing-while-drunk ballads which I expected from the mastermind behind Oasis. I don’t think it’s a case of quality, rather taste. Noel’s listed ‘The Right Stuff’ and ‘Riverman’ in the top twelve songs that he’s wrote, yet they weren’t among my favourites for this album, never mind his discography. As I write this, ‘The Right Stuff’ is starting to grow on me exponentially, so it, along with the other six, will be making their way onto a playlist of mine in the very near future. 

But that’s not to say the others aren’t good; I’m pretty sure that this man could whack out a tune consisting of white noise and snippets of a political debate, and we’d still like it. At the very least, someone would call it the long-lost Oasis song that they’ve been searching for over the last 20 years.

Long story short, if you like his solo debut from a few years ago, you’ll like (or love) Chasing Yesterday. You’d also love the deluxe version for the B-Side ‘Do the Damage’, and the personally long-awaited proper recording of ‘Freaky Teeth’. If you were after the revival of Brit-pop and all the brash sentiments which came with it, you’d be a tad disappointed. 

But, if you can look at these songs without holding certain expectations of them due to their classification in the rock genre, you’ll be in for a treat. It does seem a bit odd, the fact that the title of Chasing Yesterday has seemingly no links with his previous work, or even any of the main themes of his past album. But if I were to be cynical, I’d guess that all Noel’s recent vocal outbursts didn’t line up with the release of this album purely from coincidence, because after all, there’s no such thing as bad publicity is there? Especially for a man like him.

Regardless, he’s held it steady with his second solo release, and now has our hopes up for an equal, ideally even better, third installment. And also, he’s started singing a song about lasagna on his live tour. 

Yes, N.G.