Kevin and I rolled up to San Francisco tonight in order to catch one of our new most-favorite bands, Muse, kicking off their U.S. tour in San Francisco:

You can make out lead singer Matthew Bellamy projected on the big screen.

the quick summary - Muse was amazing. They played for about 90 minutes total, and the first third of that was one of the hardest rock shows that I have been too in awhile (and I have seen Tool quite a bit lately, so that is saying something). Muse, as a band, is a bit hard to pin down, and the concert certainly reflected that. They definitely slowed things down, and exhibited some songs that had some different beats.

I just like how the lense flare came out in this picture.

I have only memorized one Muse album, 2003's "Absolution", so most of the songs that I heard tonight were new to me. I'm guessing that most of them were off of their latest release, "Black Holes and Revelations" (which just came out on July 11th). After hearing what I heard tonight, I am definitely going to have to buy this album. However, some of the highlights for me were the songs that they played off of "Absolution", which included (in order): Time Is Running Out, Stockholm Syndrome, Hysteria, and Butterflies & Hurricanes. Those four songs were simply breath-taking live.

My wimpy camera phone caught a nice reflection from the lights.

The venue, the Concourse at the S.F. Design Center, was basically an open floor in a barn-shaped box. The ceiling wasn't very high, which meant that the stage couldn't be very high off of the ground. This, combined with a flat floor, and an abundant amount of tall people (where did the all come from?), made it pretty darn hard to see Muse (and poor Kevin certainly wasn't fairing any better). Other than that, the acoustics were fine, and Muse sounded fantastic. So, it wasn't a total loss.

This photo gives you a good sense of how the stage was laid out.

Like Tool, Muse had four video screens setup behind the stage, which projected various images during the show. Unlink Tool, these images were meant to stay in the background, and not be the entire focus of the live show. I really liked some of the images that Muse displayed -- a silhouette of horses galloping, waving lines, a rotating grid, etc. In addition, they also occasionally displayed live images of the band and the audience, sometimes distorted in real-time with effects.

All-in-all, Muse rocked my socks off, and provided one heck of a time. I really, really, really need to buy their new album now.

-Andy.

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