Muse/The Cooper Temple Clause : London Brixton Academy

When The Cooper Temple Clause slouch onto a darkened stage for their support slot, there's a deafening roar from the crowd. It's obvious they've been mistaken for Muse - but try telling TCTC that. These boys, you see, are blessed with unshakeable self-belief. Tonight they discard their spine-tingling anthem 'Let's Kill Music' just three songs in, confident that they can always slay us with the swaggering Led Zep riffs of 'The Devil Walks In The Sand', or the snarling electro-punk of new single 'Panzer Attack'. And it works. TCTC seem set to be loved as intensely by others as they are
by themselves.


There's an early test of loyalty for Muse fans tonight when their heroes choose to open with 'Micro Cuts', a song so grotesquely pompous and overwrought that it's destined to become a touchstone for Muse-haters everywhere. But on the evidence of the other new songs we hear tonight, hating Muse is about to become a whole lot more difficult. Because there's a reason that Matt Bellamy seems bored as he thrashes impatiently through crowd-pleasers like 'Uno' and 'Showbiz' - he knows that his new songs are vastly superior.


Of course, Muse being Muse, the transcendental moments do have their ghastly counterparts, and one particularly mawkish interlude is heralded by the arrival onstage of a stool and an acoustic bass. But tonight, Bellamy manages to infuse even 'Muscle Museum' with so much passion that the name 'Radiohead' barely enters your mind. And by the time balloons fill the venue during 'Bliss' - a brave stab at new romantic synth-rock - the slight frontman has given so much that he can barely summon the energy to trash his guitar.


Ultimately, this show demonstrates how far Muse have progressed in the last two years. Through a combination of ambition and bloody-mindedness, they've come up with a batch of songs that piss all over the ones that made them famous. And now that it's begun, there's no telling where this journey might end.


Niall O'Keeffe