Hear Muse Go ‘Psycho’ on New Song
After exploring the wubby depths of dubstep and dance on 2012’s The 2nd Law, Muse are back to bashing out stadium-sized riffs on new track, “Psycho,” the first taste of their upcoming LP, Drones.
The track is centered around a maddening, marching riff (not unlike Tame Impala’s “Elephant”) that spirals into a demented, howling chorus. “Psycho” also arrives with a lyric video that opens with a drill sergeant barking orders and “character building” threats into the camera, before cutting to the band performing the song amidst black-and-white military footage and a handful of eerie, surreal illustrations.
Drones is set for release on June 9th, and will be available to pre-order with an instant download of “Psycho” starting today at 7:30 p.m. GMT. The album’s first official single, “Dead Inside” will see release later this month, following a string of six small-venue UK tour dates.
The militaristic themes of “Psycho” seem in line with frontman Matt Bellamy’s description of the new album in a statement released Wednesday. “To me, ‘Drones’ are metaphorical psychopaths which enable psychopathic behavior with no recourse,” Bellamy said, touching on the LP’s conceptual arc. “The world is run by Drones utilizing Drones to turn us all into Drones. Drones explores the journey of a human, from their abandonment and loss of hope, to their indoctrination by the system to be a human drone, to their eventual defection from their oppressors.”
As for the drastic change in sound, Bellamy teased Muse’s “heavy” new album during an impromptu Twitter Q+A last summer, but also hinted at the change during a 2013 chat with Rolling Stone. “I have this strong feeling that the next album should be something that really does strip away the additional things that we’ve experimented with on the last two albums,” Bellamy said. “It will be nice to reconnect and remind ourselves of just the basics of who we are.”