208 pages
Softback
Published 2004
IMP (Independent Music Press)
ISBN 0-9539942-6-0
Muse: Inside the Muscle Museum:
The first and only book on Muse.
Formed in the mid-1990s in a sleepy sea-side Devonshire town, Muse comprises teenage friends Matt Bellamy, Chris Wolstenholme and Dominic Howard. After two low-key releases in 1998 and citing everyone from Rage Against The Machine to Tom Waits to Sergei Rachmaninov as influences, Muse were signed by four different record labels worldwide, including Madonna's Maverick Records. Their debut album Showbiz was released to critical acclaim and the band spent the following eighteen months on tour, first as guests to the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Foo Fighters then as word spread, filling the very same arenas themselves as headliners. 2001's Origin Of Symmetry album spawned Top 10 hits such as 'Plug-In Baby' and a unique version of Nina Simone's classic, 'Feeling Good'.
The grandiose ambitions and unique voice of frontman Matt Bellamy earmarked them out as a remarkable band from their very beginnings. By their third album, Absolution, the signs were all there that Muse were on the verge of becoming one of the biggest bands of the new century - here is a band of the modern era aligned with such acts as Led Zeppelin, Depeche Mode and, more recently, Radiohead.
The Muse story so far is one of excess and ideas, technological paranoia and magic mushrooms, sci-fi fantasies, ouija boards and pushing musical boundaries. This book tells that full story right from their inception up until 2004 and includes interviews conducted both with the band and those who have witnessed their climb to the top
- a position they show no sign of relinquishing any time soon.
Says Ben: "In writing this book I immersed myself completely in the world of one band. For weeks on end I listened to nothing but Muse, followed them on tour, intervewed many of their associates, traweled through press cuttings and TV footage, played their albums continuously for sixteen hours a day - this after five years of many other Muse gigs and interviews. It was fucked up. And full-on. But I think it worked - and I can still listen to them. Being of a similar age and background as the band I realised we shared many of the same references points of smalltown life, teenage drinking and a love of all things rock, so I was able to at least come close to seeing things through their eyes. The general reaction from fans of the band has been a very positive one."