Muse Are Back In The Studio… And More

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Music on my mind today:

Muse – Backdoor Large Snippet (This Is A Muse Demo, 1995)

Hello Musers!!

It has been a long time… Well, long enough that I almost forgot how to update this thing. *Note to self : Do not click the ‘delete blog’ button, as tempting and shiny as it may be*

I’d actually be quite curious to hear what everyone is doing for entertainment these days; I’ve been reading awful books (One Day by David Nicholls) and listening to shitty music (Coldplay’s newest creation with a strange name). The one good thing about this month was listening to Muse’s Exogenesis Symphony while watching a sunrise in the Gulf of Mexico:

Vacation Pictures on Flickriver

Who would have thought that Exo goes with sunrises just as well as peanut butter does with jelly? (btw, I hate PB&J sandwiches) It made me happy to be alive… /end daily sappy quota.

A shout out and two thumbs up go to Mott Bollomy, a Twitter account parodying Matt, for making #8 on the list of top 16 Gadhafi/ Gaddafi/ Quadaffi/ WhateverHisNameWas tweets (extra points for mentioning Justin Bieber!), a tweet that was mistakenly retweeted and made famous by none other than Chevrolet, one of the largest US auto makers:

Chevrolet Retweets Mott Bollomy

Top 16 Gadhafi Tweets According To Buzzfeed

– Who wants to bet that the person who retweeted the hit list with Bieber’s name on it no longer works for GM?

And, last but not least, Muse’s manager Anthony Addis talks to Billboard.biz and reveals that the band are already in the studio… something I would have never believed had I not seen the picture-proof below (click on it to enlarge it):

Anthony Addis Interview Link

October 17, 2011
By Richard Smirke, London

“Often praised as one of the greatest live acts in the world today, Muse’s latest touring run was its most successful yet. Beginning in October 2009 and wrapping this summer with a headline slot at the U.K. dual-site Reading and Leeds festival, the U.K. alt-rock act’s Resistance tour – in support of its fifth studio set, 2009′s “The Resistance” – was a 14-month global trek that included headline gigs at festivals Coachella, Glastonbury and Lollapalooza, and a stint supporting U2 in South America. (The group’s totals for the tour through the end of 2009 as reported to Billboard Boxscore saw a gross of $33,141,559 with 561,304 tickets sold on 45 shows, 21 of which were sellouts).

In this exclusive interview with Billboard.Biz, Anthony Addis, the band’s manager and director of U.K.-based Brontone Management, which also represents The Pogues and Pulled Apart By Horses, discusses what they plan to do next.

Billboard.Biz: How is work progressing on Muse’s next studio album?

Anthony Addis: They’ve now gone into the recording studio. The plan is to do it all in London… Hopefully, [the album] might come out October next year. They’ve written a lot of material already but you don’t know how it’s going to gel between them all. They write constantly. They write on the road, so before or after a gig they’ll write nearly every night. It’s a serious process, but you don’t know how it’s going to turn out [until] you start practicing it together, because everybody’s done it individually.

BBB: Have you heard any of the new material?

AA: No — I will not listen to it. I’m not interested until they believe it’s in the right form. If you trust an artist, you’ve got to trust the music that they make. You’ve got to trust that they will get it right. What’s the use of listening to something that is half-baked? … Our job is to plan the next two and half/three years from when you think they will finish it.

BBB: The Resistance Tour was Muse’s biggest and most successful yet. Is there room to further grow the band’s live operations?

AA: In America, the answer is yes — although I think the sheds are a problem. We did a joint headline show with Rage Against The Machine in L.A. at the 90,000-capacity Memorial Coliseum and there were about 55,000 people there. … People haven’t got the money anymore. I think it’s worldwide. I think it’s just hitting into the U.K. now as you can see with retail.

BBB: So what will be the live strategy going forward?

AA: I don’t know. You’ve got to look at things as you get into that position. America you can actually go into places within a two/three-month period to book upfront, whereas in Europe, you’re looking six months upfront. It’s a different strategy. You’ve got to look at what the world is out there and what your fans can afford.

BBB: A key factor in Muse’s growth as a live act has been keeping ticket prices affordable. Will that continue?

AA: Yes. Our strategy is never to rip off the fans. The fan comes to have an experience. …. He or she has worked for that money. Either that or they robbed a bank. So you’ve got to give them an experience at the right price. We’ve increased worldwide [ticket sales] by 40% each time. And that’s how we increase the fan base, because they’ve enjoyed it as a spectacle. Every night after the show we have an analysis of what went down right and what didn’t, and all of that is logged in into a database. We know what happened in every show and every city going back all the years. If a number didn’t go down well, then it will not appear in the set next time.

BBB: Muse are one of the few modern rock acts to make the transition to arena-sized venues. Why do you think so few bands are making the grade?

AA: I think the music industry has a lot of mediocre artists and groups at the moment. The record companies are feeding off mediocre, instant success and “The X-Factor” was the trouble that started it… People don’t follow the same band anymore. [Artists] are like disposable cartons. That’s what we’ve got now in the music industry, and he [Simon Cowell] started it. And you’re going to have more fallout if Warner or Universal buy EMI because they’re going to drop all the lower level [artists]. There’s still a lot of good stuff, don’t get me wrong. But it’s harder to build a career with a band because the record companies want it, but they also don’t want it. They want a killer band within an album cycle.”

P.S. Oh yes, I completely forgot to mention that the Q Awards will take place on Monday, October 24th 2011. Muse are in the running for the top title, remember? And I still think it will be the surviving members of Nirvana who will walk away with the Greatest Act Of The Last 25 Years title. What do you reckon? Now is the time to submit your guess.