ORIGIN OF SYMMETRY

MUSE are the true gunslingers of rock, the aggressive and outrageous inheritors of the front-foot attitude last demonstrated by QUEEN. Here they offer a promise of things to come by packaging five brilliant, proggy songs with half a dozen album fillers. Their voive is almost entirely MATTHEW BELLAMY's, with his THOM YORKE-like vocal delivery and from-the-hip DUANE EDDY twang and roar. This is not the crushing low power chord riffage of an OPETH or MESHUGGAH, but rather a slightly more trebly, distorted chunter, effective nonetheless.

There are some outstanding songs here. 'New Born', 'Bliss', 'Space Dementia', 'Plug In Baby' and 'Citizen Erased' are well worth a listen. The other tracks seem to me to be a level below: still worthy, but not compelling. The five aforementioned songs swagger self-confidently through your brain, sophisticated rock (not pop, there is a mid-way point between prog and pop) with a progressive colour provided by the keyboards and the complex riffs. Listen to the album's opening low-slung monster riff: all pace and verve, reaching out a greasy hand and yanking you into the record.

This is not an album in the prog rock sense, where effort goes into giving the songs cohesiveness. It is merely a collection of songs, not all of them memorable. But it is a good album, worth the investment. I can imagine 'Origin of Symmertry' might perturb the prog purist, who abhors any whiff of commerciality, but for those willing to listen to the music it will entertain and, on occasion, enthrall.

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