Photo: Emma Viola Lilja
“Fangeyeeooowreaaaydaaaayng!” In Bellamese, this is the call of the wild. In sci-fi red jacket and occasional neon Kanye shades, beneath a spray of crimson lasers and before shifting walls of 4K psychedelics, Matt Bellamy lets out his rallying bellow, charges up a squeal like a satellite screaming from a touchpad on his guitar and fires off a Hurricane Harvey of riff – the battle droid march of ‘Psycho’ maybe, or the future-metal ambush of ‘Hysteria’ – and Reading blows up right on cue.
They have a mutual understanding, Muse and R&L. It was here, as teenage punters, the band first vowed to conquer the main stages, and it was this crowd that soaked up the cult rarities of their full anniversary run through ‘Origin Of Symmetry’ in 2011. There’s an unspoken bond of appreciation that allows the band to cut back on the stadium fripperies – besides their trademark moon balloons, streamers and gargantuan space riffs, nothing comes floating over the crowd tonight – and indulge the playful showmanship of a band that has grown confident and comfortable with their headliner status.
So they throw away ‘Hysteria’, a bludgeoning ‘Stockholm Syndrome’ and a field-quaking ‘Plug In Baby’ inside the first six tunes, wrapped in riffs knobbled from Zeppelin, and Rage Against The Machine. They lob in a rare outing for ‘Showbiz’ and chekily intro bassist Chris Wolstenholme’s big groove rock moment on ‘Supermassive Black Hole’ with the five notes from Close Encounters. Most significantly, Muse’s astute premonition of the rock barometer swinging hard into the pop spectrum glares through, from the opening glam stamp of ‘Dig Down’ to the Queen aping ‘Madness’ and the show-stopping ‘Mercy’, the sound of Miley Cyrus exploding.
It all makes for a spectacular second-era setlist, relying less on their space metal breakthrough glories and reaching for ever sparklier stars. And there’s more room for surprises too; having closed out the main set with ‘Take A Bow’ promising Reading, not unreasonably, that it will “burn in hell for your sins”, Bellamy reappears to introduce “the best singer Britian has ever produced” as AC/DC’s Brian Johnson emerges to squeal through an almighty cover of ‘Back In Black’. Hell’s bells, these boys know how to steal R&L.
