Muse- 'DRONES' Album Review

*****

MUSE - DRONES

During my days in high school, I used to be a huge Muse fan, spending many evenings getting into the awesome sounds of Origin of Symmetry and Blackholes and Revelations. However, following 2009’s The Resistance, Muse have become increasingly polarising to long-term fans, particularly with 2012’s The 2nd Law, which for me was a very hit-and-miss record.

Muse’s decision to go back to rock, but maintain their bombastic style with their concept album Drones delivers a more focused album, but for me personifies everything right and wrong with Muse’s recent direction.

Muse can definitely pull off a bombastic, over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek style, and it does make great songs! ‘Dead Inside’ is powerful and catchy, whilst the Queen-styled ‘Reapers’, ‘The Handler’ and especially ‘Defector’ have some of Muse’s best guitar riffs ever!

That being said, this style can also lead to complete and utter disaster if it misses the mark. Notably, ‘Psycho’, which despite an awesome riff, has cringe-worthy lyrics and even worse voice-acting. ‘Mercy’ and ‘Drones’ also personally leave a bad taste in my mouth.

Fans will be satisfied, as it improves much on its predecessor with its hard-hitting style. Despite its flaws, it resoundingly proves Muse work much better with guitars and drums than with dubstep and synthesisers.