you will squeeze the life out of me

Photo courtesy of Hansel.

Yesterday was Big Night Out 2010, but more accurately put, it was the night of Muse. Saosin and then Rise Against performed small sets. Saosin surprisingly sounded much much louder and wilder than their album songs, like Voices was more screaming rock than I expected. Rise Against came out with similar songs, but surprised us with 2 acoustic numbers which I must admit was good. After which, the lead singer asked us if we were ready for Muse. Guess he knew what most of us were there for. And gee, when Rise Against left the stage, there was almost 40 mins before they came. They kept playing songs over the system, not too loud, and each time the music stopped, everyone would keep cheering, thinking that they would be coming out. BUT IT WAS JUST A TEASE. Anyway, I made out AnCo's My Girls and Cut Copy's Heart on Fire above the noise during the interval. And finally at 10, those 3 came out with a fucking bang. They launched into Uprising as they did for a couple of their recent sets. Thereafter it was a pure aural smashing eargasm of their songs NON STOP. They made 2 small breaks which the crowd confused as the show ending, but NO, it was just to prepare for the bad ass Exogenesis Part I and damn I can't remember when the other break took place.

The setlist was as follows:
Uprising
Supermassive Black Hole
Map of the Problematique
Resistance
Interlude
Hysteria
Stockholm Syndrome + War Within A Breath riff
Nishe
United States Of Eurasia
Sunburn
Helsinki Jam
Undisclosed Desires
MK Ultra
Starlight
Time Is Running Out
Unnatural Selection
Encore:
Exogenesis: Symphony, Part 1 (Overture )
Plug In Baby
Knights of Cydonia + Man With A Harmonica intro

What a banger of a setlist right?

It was as if right smack at Earth, Singapore time 10pm, we were transported to another plane of existence. Muse entertained us non stop for what seem like an inordinate amount of time (cue massive crowd sing along, screaming, shouting, laser lights show, but I was hoping Bellamy would smash a guitar or two, too bad all he did was just change guitars after each song). It was singularly the most awesome, plural, adrenaline charged, auraltastic, add whatever you want to say about them, Muse just tore the damn place down with their music and everything else. It's one concert I won't forget and I'm pretty sure every time I listen to their music again, I would be transported back to those instances where the crowd raged to the song as Matt let loose his vibratos (there was a chick who had a placard that said "Fuck me Bellamy" straightforward no?), Chris riffed away in a medley of madness, while Dominic banged on the drums in a flurry of hand movements. Unforgettable really - seeing Matthew Bellamy, Christopher Wolstenholme and Dominic Howard live is utterly unbelievable, like a pilgrimage to the gods. We died and went to heaven and came back, only to die again, go to heaven and come back several times over.

A couple of videos of them live in Singapore below.

Muse - MK Ultra

Muse - Hysteria

Muse - Time Is Running Out

Muse - Starlight

Muse - Plug In Baby