How does one measure one’s band’s success? Money? Popularity? Self-satisfaction? How about how much the American market latches on? If the latter is the case, then Muse has finally made it. Thankfully, that’s not how bassist Chris Wolstenholme measures his group’s success, no matter what popular media might make of it all. Regardless, Muse has had some pretty interesting ups and downs, both in their earlier North American experiences, as well as on their mid-2004 jaunt around the continent. Wolstenholme sat down in Vancouver before the last show on that leg of their tour to give me the goods on what they’ve been up to and why they’re only just now really forging into the American market.

Wolstenholme tests the squishy and deep seats in the green room with a surprised chuckle before he begins talking about the tour. “It’s been really good actually. I think when we came over we weren’t really sure what to expect you know, with the North American audience because we haven’t been over here in about four years. It’s been about four years since we were last here and our second record didn’t actually come out over here. We had some problems with our record company [Maverick Records]. So I think we sort of had it in our heads that we were gonna come here and play to twenty, thirty people a night and we kind of thought it would be like starting from scratch a little bit. But I think the reaction and the amount of people that have been coming to the shows has been a real, real surprise, and I think the amount of people that have been aware of all of the stuff we’ve done before, even though it didn’t really come out here, just kinda surprised us a bit as well… it’s been way, way better than we thought it would be.”

It must have been quite a shock for them, considering how everything had gone in the past with their first release, Showbiz, in the late nineties. Even myself and some others were stunned to know how quickly shows had been selling out for them on this tour, after years of no one paying much attention, and the band still not fitting consistently into mainstream rock radio. The only other shows they’d played on this side of the Atlantic before were media showcases for the Showbiz record, and an opening slot on a small Midwestern leg of a Red Hot Chili Peppers/Foo Fighters tour in 1999 and 2000. They haven’t been back since then, and have certainly noticed a lot of changes.

Stepping back a moment to the Showbiz release on Maverick, Wolstenholme discusses briefly why the rift occurred with the label. “I think we sold maybe 25 or 50 thousand… I mean it wasn’t a massive amount.” That wasn’t a bother for Muse, as they’d had a gradual rise all over the world rather than a sudden explosion of popularity. “Even in England and most of Europe when it first came out, it didn’t sell massive amounts, but I think that the more we toured, the more the record kind of sold. And then obviously by the time we came to the second album, we had more of a fan base there, but I think the main reason it didn’t really do that well over here was just because we didn’t come over here.” Maverick had expected more lofty results from them however, hence the issue. “I think the way [Maverick] saw us was different from the way we saw ourselves. We kind of saw ourselves as a live band, or a band that needs to be out there and touring and in front of people to get the right kind of idea about what we were about… I think [Maverick] kind of saw us as a pop band that was gonna get this massive radio hit single and then sell millions and millions of albums, and it obviously didn’t happen that way.” He laughs at that. It’s all in the past now, and seemingly for the best. “Now we're on a different label [a division of Warner] so it’s kind of working out better. I think the label over here now, they kind of understand what we’re about, and they think that it’s important for us to be seen live.”

There’s a much better-organized and concerted effort to appeal to the US market with Absolution, their third release, and the album they were touring for at this point. “Absolution’s been out in England and Europe for about six months now, and we decided that we actually wanted to stagger the releases just purely to be able to tour Europe… kind of get all that out of the way and then spend time over here. ‘Cause obviously if it had all come out at the same time we would have had to have been here and in Europe all at the same time… And we’ll be doing some festivals [in Europe] over the summer but apart from that we’ve kind of got as much time to spend here as we want really for the rest of the year. It’s really cool.”

Doing so much touring in so many different parts of the world within a fairly short amount of time allows the band to discover how certain regions react to them over others. “I think the thing that we’ve noticed in America is the audiences are different in every state. It’s really strange. It’s kind of like that in Europe as well I mean, you kind of go from France to Germany or whatever, and no matter what country you’re in, it always feels different and the crowd always feels different… there’s a massive difference over here between the east coast and the west coast I think. The first few gigs we did on the west coast, it felt so much more punk over there you know… fans when we play in Cali just go absolutely crazy and it just seems like there’s people flying everywhere… other people will just kind of stand there and watch on the east coast, whereas the west coast people just kind of assume you’re a punk band and go nuts.” Wolstenholme seems pretty amused by that reaction. He chuckles before talking about some festival experiences.

“[Coachella in California] went really good… it’s a really nice festival. And the only festival we’d ever done before in America was the Woodstock in ‘99 where people started trashing the place… that was a pretty bad festival experience in general because all the festivals we’re used to doing in Europe are kind of these beautiful, out in the countryside, you know, on farms and things like that, and we went over there and it was all set on this old air base or something. And the stage we were playing on was actually inside an old aircraft hangar. It just felt like a really weird place to have a festival. I can remember it being really hot and there was no where to get any water and everyone was passing out and dehydrating and it was just generally a bit of a disaster. It was kind of like… 'is that what American festivals are like?!' We weren’t sure what to think. And then Coachella was just like totally different.”

He asks me if I’ve been to it before going on somewhat dreamily. “It’s just absolutely amazing, I mean the whole setting and the way it’s organized is just really, really good, and there was loads of really good bands playing as well. But the only thing that was wrong with it really was the heat. I mean we went on stage and it was like 115 when we were playing on stage and I think we got three or four songs into the set and everyone was just absolutely fucked basically.” And no, I haven’t been to Coachella before.

So things have certainly changed a lot. As earlier mentioned, it seems that very, very suddenly, the entire planet knows about and has a burning need to see Muse play. The show in Vancouver was bumped from a smaller venue because the first batch of tickets sold out in a couple of days. And that wasn’t the only city that had happened in. “Yeah in a way I think the fact that we didn’t come here for four years, and obviously there’s the bunch of people that kind of knew us from Showbiz, and even I suppose word of mouth got around and I think a lot of people got [the second album] Origin Of Symmetry off the internet. So I think in a way it worked out well because it gave us a chance to get into a position where we were in Europe and built up to that level and then be able to be stable and to afford to move away from Europe, come over here and not be forgotten about in Europe. And I think also because we haven’t been here for like four years, the suspense has been built up a little bit, and even the people that don’t know us maybe have heard the name and they’re just curious…”

The band isn’t so concerned with people who are merely curious, possibly to the point of being skeptical, at their shows. Having a room only full of diehard fans is less important than perhaps reaching or breaking down a new bunch of people who didn’t know about them before. “I think you kind of get that everywhere now [skeptical, jaded people]. I think you get that in a lot of major cities. I mean it definitely happens in London. I know the first few gigs we did in London it was like a real battle to - especially when you’re a new band and people don’t really know you that well - it’s a real battle to go in there and get people to just kind of loosen up. It’s always like, ‘impress me.’ …I think that that’s just sort of aggravating but it’s not something that we really worry about too much ‘cause I think for every one of those there’s someone who’s really enjoying themselves.”

Such was the case in Toronto on this tour, where the gig there was switched over to be an exclusively radio-station-giveaway show. Muse’s message board was packed with irate Toronto-area fans who were pissed off that after waiting patiently for years for Muse to even come to the city, they now were going to be forced to listen to a mainstream rock radio station that was barely even playing the band, to try and win tickets to this coveted show. I followed the soap opera for a bit and found that eventually, most of those fans found tickets by some means or another. It’s still the same deal though. While they don’t have too much say in what format the tickets are attainable by the public, they just were happy to get a full tour in North America. “Most of the gigs on this tour have been cheap tickets and whatnot and there’s been a certain number of gigs that have been radio giveaways. I think it’s just kind of important for us to get here at least, you know what I mean, and just do something rather than not come. I don’t think we were really fussed about what we were gonna do, whether it was doing this kind of thing or doing radio giveaways or maybe even supporting another band. I think all those radio giveaway type of things are all pretty good. Some of them are a little weird ‘cause I think, sometimes it’s just the people that come to the gig who aren’t necessarily fans of the band and they just go, ‘ooh free ticket!’”

Wolstenholme continues to say that even through some less-than-enthusiastic audiences, there haven’t been any terrible gigs as far as the crowd is concerned. However, they’ve hit a series of misadventures on the entire tour, from their first show even up until the show right before this interview. On the very first night of the tour, singer Matthew Bellamy whacked his face on his guitar and ended up a bloody wreck. “The guitar hit him pretty well. We were sort of worried at first because it looked pretty nasty when he first hit it because his lip was pretty much hanging open… It was just a disaster really. The first time we’d been here in four years, it’s the first gig, and probably like the fifth song or something and then that happened, and we turn around and there’s just blood everywhere, you know. I think my initial reaction was that he’d knocked a tooth out or something. And uh he kinda just ran off stage and we followed him off the stage and I think he looked in a mirror and realized how bad it was and then you know… kinda started puking up everything… so we obviously had to cancel that gig and cancel Philadelphia too because he had stitches in his mouth. But luckily we got back on track for the New York gig, so we really had to only cancel one.”

I’d heard a few different stories about exactly what had happened, but Wolstenholme cleared that up for me. “He kind of just went like this (makes some spazzy guitar move that tosses his head forward quickly) with his guitar and he, and I guess his guitar just flipped up or something, or he kind of stumbled and somehow his guitar went into his face and went right through… [now] he’s got a bit of a scar there, he’s just got this little line down his lip. It could have been a lot worse.”

Welcome to America, guys. The fun didn’t stop there. “…last night we had a bit of a nightmare. I think like the whole power on the stage disappeared. But what we didn’t actually realize it was all coming out of the front okay ‘cause we all wear these in-ear monitor things, and they all kind of went down. We thought the PA had gone down as well but apparently everything was still working okay. And we were like messing around going, ‘well what the fuck’s gone wrong?’ It was really messed. And then we did one in Sacramento as well where about three or four songs into the gig the entire power went down and… I think it’s happened quite a bit over this last week actually. Hopefully it won’t happen tonight.” He laughs nervously, but it was unnecessary, as the gig went off without a hitch as far as I could tell. The crowd loved every second, I haven’t been to a show that’s even nearly stacked up since then. It was topped by an insane ending that saw Bellamy fly into a blind rage and destroy everything on stage, tossing pieces of the drum kit around, knocking over amps, snapping guitar strings, just carrying on until there was nothing left to drum on and the guitar was virtually unplayable. Wolstenholme capped the destruction off by grabbing the last cymbal and smashing it into the floor.

In this age of transitional technology, it’s interesting to note the differences around the world in media and how the band has utilized what’s available to them. We’ve already determined that Muse isn’t exactly on high radio rotation in North America, and that fans aren’t very pleased about that. Wolstenholme recognizes that the lack of radio play can have an impact on their popularity, even though he’s more than satisfied with the attention they’ve received this time around. “I think [radio play] probably is more so [an issue in North America] than in England. Because in England it’s just generally pretty easy. I mean as long as you’re reasonably commercial, there’s only one radio station to get onto, and that’s Radio One, sort of like the big national radio. But because over here there is no national radio, there’s just hundreds and thousands and thousands of little radios, it’s kind of difficult… in England, one song on one radio station gives you full-on coverage all over the country. It’s kind of hard to get your CD on every single however-many-thousand radio stations here. It’s important… obviously lots of people listen to radio over here compared to England and a lot of people here heard us for the first time on the radio. But I think it’s definitely picked up… there are more and more stations that are adding the track now…” He feels radio is still relevant, even though he doesn’t listen to it much himself other than just in the car for example.

But the world is changing, and bands need to be using the internet more and more to get the word out there. Actually, any band would be foolish to dismiss a strong online presence. Online music resources, from the band’s own website, to those oh-so-controversial music download sites, have afforded the band the worldwide following they currently enjoy. Their official message board has an entire section dedicated to fans from around the globe, and there’s a thread in there representing a huge myriad of different languages and countries. Wolstenholme likes being able to see what the fans are up to on the board, but admits that with his limited time, and with the huge amount of content on the board, it’s a little bit difficult. “We used to [look around the board] in the early days back when we started to get the website up and running. I think the first time we ever had a message board was around the time the second album came out. We were just like totally amazed by the amount of people that went on it and I can remember we put it on this server and it turned out that this server just wasn’t fast enough for it, and all the servers were crashing and stuff and we ended up having to spend a shitload of money making sure that it was all kind of stable. Yeah, it was kind of weird at first ‘cause we were all just really surprised at the amount of people that actually go online and make the effort to post a message about whatever. It’s kind of difficult these days cuz there’s so much on there… but you know, we have a little look now and then. See what people are saying, you know.” He has a laugh about that. It seems like Muse’s history has just been one shock after another. Wolstenholme seems to imply that it’s bizarre that anyone pays them any attention at all, never mind so many people all at once. Humbling, isn’t it?

Even now as the band rises in popularity, he still sees the value in having the songs passed from ear to ear via downloading. “Obviously certain people, they download all the time and don’t buy records at all but… I’m probably one of those people as well to be honest. I don’t really buy that many CDs anymore. I don’t think [downloading’s] ever really a bad thing, I mean I don’t think it really matters too much how people hear your music, you know. I think as long as they do hear it, and I think at the end of the day people always come to see you live. I think the thing is, from the band’s point of view, unless the band is absolutely massive, you don’t really make that much money from records anyway. I think most bands our kind of level always make money through touring or whatever. That’s never really been a problem for us ‘cause I think if people have downloaded every single song we’ve ever done, they still come to see us live ‘cause they like it… I mean, you don’t have to pay for it if it’s on the radio. I don’t really see much difference you know. I know a lot of record companies have real issues with it, but if CDs weren’t so expensive in the first place… It doesn’t really cost that much to put a CD together in a sort of little pack, you know, put it in a package and sell it for... I don’t know, how much are CDs over here?” I describe how we’ve got the cheapest CDs in the world in Vancouver and how that stacks up to the UK, where discs retail for almost twice as much, but he still agrees that $13 or $14 for a CD is far more than it needs to be.

One thing that I had noticed more and more, as more and more media outlets began to talk about the band, is that it’s often referred to as “The Muse.” I ask Wolstenholme if that misnomer bothers them at all, and after addressing that specific question, it launches him into a description of an old battle from the days of the signing with Maverick. “The Muse! Ha ha. It happens a lot in North America, but for some reason it doesn’t really happen anywhere else in the world. I just think it’s quite funny. I think the thing is there’s a lot of bands with ‘the this’ or ‘the that’ or whatever you know. So just like a one word name is quite unusual. But nah, I just think it’s quite funny.” He continues to talk about how the confusion might have something to do with another band who shared the name. “There actually was [a band with the same name], when Showbiz started to come out. We had this problem with this other band. There was a band back in the 60s called Muse I think. And then there was this band in North America back in the, it was probably in the mid-90s and they released an album called Arcana [He’s not kidding… check this out]. And I can remember way way before we got our first record deal, I remember we were looking on the internet and I found out about a band that released this album called Arcana and we didn’t realize they were still going. And uh, we came to releasing the album and the record company did like a trademark search or whatever, and it actually turned out that this band had had the name since 1991. At the time I don’t think they were actually doing anything, but all of a sudden they sort of realized that we wanted the name and you know… they took us to the cleaners and they got a shitload of money out of us just to get the name, and then they suddenly reformed with this new name...”

So it’s been an interesting ride for them. They seem to have finally conquered the entire planet, at least as far as the major music-consuming markets go. Wolsteholme is fairly casual about the importance of the Last Great Frontier, the mighty US market, and maintains a pretty moderate goal for the future. “I think it’s important to give it a go. I think we always felt that we’d done really well in Europe and parts of Australia and Japan, and we kind of thought there’s no reason why we couldn’t do the same here. I mean it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s gonna blow up or anything like that… but at least it would be nice to come over and always play this kind of size venue you know.”

Elsewhere

By Andy Scheffler
Photos : Andy Scheffler
Published : July 31, 2004.