måndag 28 Jul 2008, 2:29
OK… Sorry to all you Argentine fans expecting a review in Spanish, it's just not happening… or at least not from me anyway. You're going to have to read this in English if you can be bothered.
We (chucknorris2 and some other friends) arrived at the theatre at about 20:40 in plenty of time so that I would have time to buy some merchandise as I had heard it would be much cheaper compared to the previous times I've seen Muse, and it's true. I got a T-shirt for 40 pesos (₤6.50) compared to ₤18 in England and the haarp CD+DVD for 35 pesos (₤6) which is at least half what I´d pay in England.
Unfortunately, the T-shirts were no where as good (design wise) as those they had at Wembley and I had to resort to buying the T-shirt with the cover design for invincible on.
We then went to get our seats in the front row of the Super Pullman section where we would get a great view of the band and waited for the gig to start.
The band were about half an hour late coming on and the crowd were getting really impatient by the time the band finally came singing, of all things, football chants.
The band came on to their normal intro music which is really just dance of the knights.
They entered into a ver energetic Knights of Cydonia. I personally think this song sucks at the beginning of the night and Take a Bow is a much better starting song as it just builds and builds expectation, though for the firsttime I really enjoyed having Knights of Cydonia as the first track and I love how it just immediately throws you into a fast paced concert.
After the first track the crowd were so worked up singing fotball chants that the band couldn't start the next song so Dominic Howard played the drums along with the chant before continuing into Hysteria which they played fantastically well and being a song I have fallen out of favour with recently it has brought me back to really loving it.
Map of the Problematique with their normal ending maggie's farm riff was up next to give the crowd a bit of respite before pounding into Supermassive Black Hole which they either didn't play as well as the other times I've seen them, or the audience here just doesn't enjoy it as much as in England. Either way, it was a slight disappointment, though that was definitely forgotten when they played the next song which is something I would never in my wildest dreams expected them to play.
It was Fury, a song originally only released on the Japanese version of absolution and then released as the B-side to sing for absolution.
After that, came out the piano for a superb rendition of New Born with a riff and ending with the end of Ashamed and into Butterflies and Hurricanes which was in opinion terrible, though not because of the band in this case. Here the problem was the lighting. It had no linkin to the music whatsoever. It waas flashing all over the place, out of sync through out the whole climatic first verse and only rectifying itself fully by the piano solo.
It really ruined the piece for me though one thing that was very good was that at the end of the piano solo when Matt bellamy swapped back to guitar jets of fog shot up from the front of the stage filling the otherwise prolonged moment which happens at other concerts.
After that, they played a riff known as Drum and Bass and then Matt returned to the piano for Apocalypse Please and Space Dementia, both played well, but not being songs I'm a huge fan of, I didn't particularly enjoy them.
Then, another 2 songs I'm not a fan of, but were innevetibaly to be played which were
Invincible and Starlight, though they were both played extremely well and were realy complimented by the venues acoustic abilities which are nothing short of wonderous.
They then played a riff of Burning Bridges and an exceptional rendition of Time Is Running Out.
Then came Plug In Baby and big balloons which was also played well.
After that, an encore of the best version of Stockholm Syndrome I've seen them play and the finally of Take a Bow with it's climatic song leaving the feeling of "yeah, but what of it" at the end of the concert and completely damping the effect of the amazingly well done Stockholm Syndrome.
I admit, I left the building singing come fly with me which they played after the band had filed off.
Overall I think the concert was defintely the best I've seen Muse play by a long way. I think it's because here in Argentina they still have to make a name for themselves and have to work once again to be famous. The venue, having a capacity of 3,300 is also the perfect size for the band as they're such an uncommunicative band they feel too distant at bigger venues, and even cold when they were at Wembley Stadium.
The crowd was also great. They really know how to enjoy themselves, even if the fact that they kept inging football anthems really got up my left nostril as chants should stay on the pitch and at a Muse concert they should continue singing the song before as happens in concerts in the united kingdom, as thats more event specific.
I was also not immensely impressed with the setlist. I'd have loved them to play assassin, citizen erased, fillip and city of delusion. I was also hoping for Dead Star as I'm absolutely loving that song at the moment and they played it on every previous night on the tour, however as this was the second night in the same city I wasn't expecting them to play it.
After the concert, we made our way to DeBar where they were to have an evening of Muse entertainment, showing the tour DVDs and interviews. However we left before it began feeling that it would be nothing compared to the actual concert and because the streets would still be safe to use to get home.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUya_ezoTa0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MJ8ID5LXeE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hSgRsMkedM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2BFx7p8U0U