Music reviews: Muse, Leftfield, Of Monsters and Men

As a supermassive fan of their earlier riff-driven recordings, I thought Blackholes & Revelations was the last Muse album worth banging a head to before the English prog rock trio went on to rival U2 as one of the biggest rock-lite bands in the world.

After the synth-heavy arena glam of their previous two mega charttopping albums, for their seventh studio album, Drones, Matt Bellamy &Co promised a more back-tobasics approach. For this “return to their roots”, Muse turned to producer Mutt Lange (Def Leppard, AC/DC) and the formidable riffthrobbing Reapers with its guitar noodlings and operatic warblings certainly would have sat nicely on Muse’s classic rock album Origin of Symmetry.

The thumping riff of lead single Psycho is taken from their live-show encores, but Bellamy’s obsession with government conspiracies and a dystopian future still offers up some trite lyrics. Revolt is this album’s Knights of Cydonia, with Muse channelling their inner Queen again, but Mercy is unexciting. They may consider Drones a simpler creation, but in Muse’s hands, it’s still a formidable and grandiose beast.

Muse Drones (Warner Bros)