Interview (200009 Designer Magazine feature)
An interview with Christopher Wolstenholme in the September 2000 issue of Designer Magazine.
Q: Does it feel good to be in the studio after months on the road?
A: Its been good, totally different from when we've been in before. We've been in for about 2 week and there's about six tracks completed. I think its a lot better this time and its sounding different from what you'd expect Muse to sound like.
The first half of the album is produced by a guy called Dave Bottrel who did the last Deus album and a Tool album. The second half is going to be produced by John Leckie again. It doesn't sound like Tool but as you imagine its going to be more rocking. The idea of getting two producers in was to get more of a diversity on the album, to get the heavy stuff more heavier, and the more mellow stuff to be done by John Leckie because that's what he's good at.
Q: How do you feel about "Showbiz" in retrospect?
A: Looking back there isn't much difference sonically between the mellow stuff and the heavier tracks. The heavy stuff really could have been a lot heavier and that's what we want to do with this album. I think it was perhaps a bit of a one sounding album. But were going to bring this one together by getting Andy Wallace to mix the whole lot, just to get that consistency so it doesn't sound like two different albums.
Q: Would you say its been a gradual change into the rock beast that is now Muse?
A: Well, Melody Maker said in a review that we'd gone metal but its not quite like that. The new material is a lot heavier and its just generally more raw. When we've been recording drums we've brought in this massive big PA and recording it that way rather than the traditional miking up the actual drums. That's what Dave does to get that really heavy drum sound.
There's is going to some ballads on the album, but I don't think they'll be as obvious as "Unintended" which was a straightforward love song. With that track everyone said that it had to be a single whereas with what were recording now I don't think there is an obvious single's. When we recording we did at first think "Shit" but as a band we really care more about the whole package of the album than how we perform in the singles charts.
Q: What do you think will be the first single?
A: "Plug In Baby" was one of the first things we recorded, its ready for mixing now and I think people can expect that as the first single around January or February.
It would be funny more than anything if we went and got a top 10, just because we know we'd be straight out the next week. I don't think the current musical climate of Coldplay and co will affect us because there's very few of our fans that would say "Unintended" or "Falling Down", the majority of the people are into the heavier stuff anyway. The people who have seen us live will know its heavier and it been heavier the longer we've played.
Q: Why re-release "Muscle Museum" again?
A: Its something that we haven't particularly happy with. But we came to an agreement that if we were going to do it we'd do totally different artwork and besides. There was a lot of pressure put on us by the record company and you kind of have to put your trust in them at the end of the day. It does upset the hard-core fans because only about 4,000 people bought the single the first time round which compared to Sunburn and Unintended which sold about 40-50,000.
Remixes is something we've always wanted to get into on the B-sides and with the Soulwax one it just worked out. The song structures identical but its got beats and weird noises over the top. The controversial Timo Mass remix of "Sunburn" is also on there, but we really like. As well as that there's a couple of rare muse tracks, "Agitated" which was a vinyl only track and "Spiral" which was on the Japanese album.
Q: What are the plans for America next year?
A: There's nothing mapped out as yet but I think we will be spending more time in the States. The only tour we did over there this year was with the Chilli Pepper's which lasted about a month. The tour went really well but as far as record sales went it wasn't too hot.
There's so many ways you can approach the States. We were talking about releasing a different album, just one that was really rock because that's what goes down well over there. It was an idea but we really didn't want two albums floating around.
We're not really the sort of band to have any radical image changes, so Matt's blue hair was definitely a one off. I've never seen Slipknot but from what I've heard they put on really great shows. One of the best bands from America are probably the Deftones who don't really fit in that category of a big rock show, they just get on stage and rock. From a live point of view its bands like Rage and the Deftones who'd I like to watch.
As regards the UK and Europe we will definitely do a tour, but we will be concentrating more on America. This year we've already done 5 tours over here whereas we only spent 3 or 4 weeks over there.
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