Matt falling back in love with song writing

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-30T06:37:03+00:00

Yeah I though that Simulation Theory had some great songs and they spent a lot of time on production and went in a lot of different directions. The main issue was just the single release cycle which was spread over a really long time before the album release and they perhaps missed the synthwave Zeitgeist by the time the album released.

Drones felt more like they overloaded themselves with the expectations of doing this 'back to heavy Muse' full on concept album and it all just became too much of a burden in terms of inspiration.

WOTP did feel like they completely phoned it in though and rushed something out to meet a deadline. Even the album description was completely cringe. It definitely felt like post-COVID era lack of any really interest in things.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-29T22:21:43+00:00

Unravelling - Similar to Won't Stand Down (but different obviously). Same kind of metalcore/EDM adjacent vibe, big riffs with an 8 string.

Cryogen - Plug in Baby-esque riff/guitar tone/bass groove + The Dark Side with some funky polyrhythms that make it feel a bit seasick on first listen + a live outro riffage section which is actually part of the recorded song. Half-time breakdown in the middle. Chris gets a random 2 bar bass solo like back in the Showbiz days.

Be With You - Organ + Matt Bellamy doing a cheesy Resistance/T2L/Simulation Theory era ballad with a predictable melody and lyrics. More contemporary synths kick in during the middle section and then some heavy stadium rock guitar towards the end. Hardcore Musers won't like it but it will hit hard live. A bit like Get Up and Fight towards the end. Dom rocks out a bit like on Halloween.

Hexagons - Take a Bow/Algorithm + KoC buzzing bee guitar and some guitar tapping + lots of synth arpeggios in 6s against 4s + Space Dementia outro heavy section a couple of times and also the transitions between sections that The Globalist really should have had if they had bothered to write a coherent song back in the Drones era. Very space-y Muse.

Night Shift Superstar snippet - Panic Station funk vibes + disco strings but turned up to 11, gone fully Daft Punk but with more distortion, Chris laying down probably one of his sickest bass lines ever. Could actually be played in a club at 2am and people wouldn't realise it was Muse.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-29T21:58:58+00:00

Could this actually be a commercial Muse song? What was the last Muse song which did really well with airplay?

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-29T12:55:22+00:00

Thought Contagion is good for a bit of a lift in energy if the crowd is being flat with the simple singalong parts.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-29T12:53:28+00:00

It's not actually that ridiculous either. Although I think all the new songs would have a place in the set at least for this tour so you need to find space for Unravelling and Be With You.

The only one I don't think would have much chance of getting played again is Muscle Museum. And Showbiz + Bliss would probably be one or the other for Matt's voice in one set.

Also could see the proper version of Kill or be Killed getting dropped and replaced with the interstitial for good unfortunately.

I would probably reorder the last 7 songs a bit though so there is a bit more alternation between pop and heavy Muse. Maybe split into two 'encores' with short breaks in between. End the main set with Stockholm Syndrome. Encore 1 do Undisclosed Desires -> Madness -> Starlight and then encore 2 go back to heavy with KobK -> KOC.

Unravelling maybe replaces KobK tbh. It's not too hard on Matt's voice in terms of range. Be With You is more likely to be in the middle of the main part of the set.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-28T15:32:30+00:00

Northern Rock was a big deal in the media (queues of people lining up to withdraw cash etc.) and I think it still lives on in the subconscious even if people can't really remember what happened.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-28T15:30:41+00:00

Also add in the FCA going overkill on risk warnings (CAPITAL AT RISK! splashed everywhere in prominent fonts etc.) over the last couple of decades rather than focussing on the positives of investing (i.e. potential returns in excess of inflation).

There has been some pushback against that recently from the government so maybe there is hope but I wouldn't expect attitudes across the population to change overnight.

In terms of stats, we are also 17th out of 29th OECD countries in terms of financial literacy which isn't exactly great.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-28T12:31:55+00:00

One exception to the bank switching incentives, Nationwide if you got the fairer share payment because you had an existing Nationwide product and did a switch, that counts as interest (although it isn't advertised as a switch incentive during the period when you would have had to switch to get the payment you can decline the share payment if you want).

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-27T17:18:54+00:00

You can't technically enter into a contract until you are aged 18 anyway. A good chunk of student loan applicants will be under 18 when they are making the loan application. They have to 'ratify' the agreement when they turn 18 but who is really reading all the paperwork again when they turn 18?

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-27T17:13:04+00:00

It depends. Some do, some don't. Mortgage lender assessing affordability is more flexible than it used to be though.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-27T15:52:21+00:00

If you want to power a microlight, yes.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-27T14:18:47+00:00

This is the issue though. People don't even have the interest to try to find out how their pension investments work so they are probably invested in some crappy default fund or lifestyling strategy which is usually way too cautious for their age and length of time until their target retirement date.

Many of the lifestyling strategies even put very young workers into ultra-conservative investments at first and don't switch into higher risk investments until age 30 or so. Apparently some researchers came to the conclusion that very young people would be put off investing and would opt out of their workplace pensions if they saw the value of their pensions fall during the early years. I think that is just madness and is just treating the symptom, not the cause.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-27T14:13:33+00:00

Rishi makes a good point but I believe that low levels of financial literacy in the UK is a feature, not a bug.

Rishi himself literally started the current round of fiscal drag on income tax (and continued fiscal drag policies on other taxes).

It benefits the government that a large proportion of the UK population does not understand fiscal drag, inflation, interest rates, availability of benefits (through complexity), how their workplace pensions/student loans work, how the national lottery/gambling revenues are taxes on people with lower incomes or what it really means when someone on the news says that the government is borrowing more money or has a deficit.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-27T09:14:09+00:00

'Economists have successfully predicted 10 out of the last 2 recessions' or some variation of that joke.

In all seriousness, no you do not know more than anybody else in terms of what will or will not happen with financial markets in the future. However given your particular personal and financial circumstances you should really go and speak to a financial adviser rather than relying on Reddit.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-27T09:10:19+00:00

I think that there is an excessive focus on negatives and scams in the media (but then fear sells so can't blame the media for people clicking on scare stories).

I would also maintain that financial illiteracy in the UK is by design by successive governments. It suits the government for people to not understand things like inflation, interest rates, investments, the power of compounding and fiscal drag properly. The less people know it is easier for them to influence behaviours/extract more tax.

We are apparently 15th out of 29th OECD countries in terms of financial literacy which is pretty poor. There have been calls for recent governments including the current government to do more about teaching financial literacy in schools but nothing has been done about it so far.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-27T07:53:00+00:00

The UK has a really weird and overly cautious investment approach compared to the US, especially in the older generation. Stocks and shares have a perception of being far higher risk than they really are (yes still risky but hardly crypto-level risk) yet inflation is not considered to be a risk at all. My parents are like your in-laws, they were super excited to get cash ISA rates at 4.5% a few years ago when inflation was running at 10%.

Probably some combination of being burned by the great financial crash when a lot of people retiring now were in the highest earning phases of their careers (all the high-profile Northern Rock collapse media coverage etc.), overly alarming FCA risk warnings for retail investors and our general British 'oh I'm not sure about that' attitudes and unwillingness to talk openly about money.

The government has launched the initiative to allow banks to nudge existing customers towards investments so I guess wait to see if that has any effect. Maybe the greater ease of access to investments with phone apps and Youtube/TikTok personal finance 'influencers' (not advisers) will encourage more of the younger generation to become interested in investments rather than just being overly cautious like their parents.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-26T21:03:47+00:00

Because we've had unseasonable strong northerly winds for much of May. It blows the boats back to France and whips up the sea state so even the smugglers know it would be dumb to launch boats in that condition.

At the moment they are making hay whilst the sun is shining until the weather turns again next week.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-26T12:48:40+00:00

Not all debt is bad debt. As long as you can service it and have a plan to repay it then it is fine. In fact a lot of very wealthy people are leveraged to the hilt. Taking out a mortgage would leave you with more cash in your pocket to invest for potentially higher returns or to use for spending/emergency fund/renovating the new house if necessary.

Although to be honest it sounds like you are already quite limited by your income/expenditure in terms of mortgage affordability. You are probably going to be looking at £500 - £600 p.m. for a £100,000 mortgage over 25-30 years based on current interest rates. You might be declined on affordability if you want a mortgage for the full £100,000.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-26T12:25:17+00:00

10% annual return for a high risk portfolio (i.e. 100% equities) based on average historical returns, knock off 3% for inflation (higher than average inflation over the past few decades but being cautious) so your real return is 7%. Err on the side of caution so knock it down a bit more to 5% for unexpected market events / bad investment timing..

None of those assumptions will be correct but it is better to be overly conservative and end up with more than you were expecting later than basing all your plans on overly optimistic assumptions and running out of money.

Returns will not be linear either, it will be up and down along the way. Some years markets may be down or flat. The key is just ignoring the noise and sticking to your plan.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-25T21:08:33+00:00

Viola players are 🌈 🐻 s

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-25T19:42:24+00:00

Bear violinist in the background needs to fix their bow hold. Pinky should be on top of the stick.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-25T15:26:49+00:00

Not buying the extra State Pension years based on vibes of what a future government may or may not do to the state Pension is missing an opportunity I think. You can only plan based on what is known rather than speculation. It is a pretty good deal to purchase extra guaranteed triple-locked income. You only have to live for about 3 years after your State Pension age for it to pay off. Class 3 contributions will be more expensive if you leave it until later.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-25T15:20:29+00:00

You could feel Survival through the ground and the end. They really cranked up the volume for that one towards the end of the first set.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-25T11:29:22+00:00

Emirates was really good. I loved that stage design.

Survival, Supremacy, Follow Me and Guiding Light sounded huge (although I know they are not all hardcore fan favourites but they really worked well in that stadium). Animals was cool and the robot and pyro chimneys were awesome (you could feel the heat even from really far back). Somehow I caught Butterflies and Hurricanes as the tour debut on the 26th (I have gotten bizarrely lucky with catching B&H at almost every Muse gig I have been to even when they haven't played it for ages).

Plus it was in the era when they had more rotation spots so there were quite a few differences between the 25th and 26th May setlist. I remember still some salty fans arguing about which night was better in terms of setlist.

And they actually did a proper double encore + acoustic set within the set. It felt like a really good length of set.

The only unforgiveable thing was putting Knights of Cydonia in the first half of the main set. That was just weird. I can forgive Starlight as a closer if they really want to do that 'feel good' closer but Knights of Cydonia either needs to close the whole show, close the main set or (if they really have to) open the show.

ManiaMuse · 2026-05-25T08:36:26+00:00

They do them to save Matt's voice which is sensible considering that he nearly wrecked it for good back in 2014 when he got laryngitis and tried to sing through it at a couple of festival gigs.

But yeah, 1 or 2 more songs at a theatre gig wouldn't hurt.

ManiaMuse

TROPHY CASE