SPREAD THE GOOD MUSE!

An electric guitar is sent violently skywards. The amp on stage is pushed to the floor. All in an instant, jerky movement. The audience watch in astonishment; the drummer looks bewildered, even a little worried.
But this is not The Who at Woodstock nor The Clash in the Hammersmith Palais, but Muse s Matthew Bellamy during their live studio performance on TFI Friday. To paraphrase Marx, this is history repeating itself as farce. So what s the big idea was Bellamy in a huff because Chris Evans announced the band as Sunburn the name of their single?
"Not at all," says the Muse singer and olympian axe-thrower. "It s just that earlier that day, I d been watching this Who video in the tourbus and I was pretty blown away by Pete Townshend."
This was back in February, and Muse were later that night to celebrate their single Sunburn going Top 20 in the UK charts (they had just done Top Of The Pops that week too) by playing the final sell-out gig of their British tour to an up-for-it ULU crowd. The gig showcases Muse as one of the more edgy performers of the new breed of rock n roll prodigies the critics spin it as Jeff Buckley sings Radiohead.
Bellamy reckons the R word just keeps cropping up because their debut album, Showbiz 200,000 copies and counting sold worldwide had its knobs pulled by one John Leckie, the man who gave The Bends its shape.
Bellamy and his fellow Devon-ites jet-setted off to Japan the day after the London showdown. How did the lads get on in the East? And just what are Oriental audiences like to play for?
"They watch more than they jump," he answers. "They hung on my every gesture if I just looked at the crowd and grinned, they all sighed! It was quite strange. Australia was more like England. We were there for about a week, doing gigs in pretty small venues."
With his angular cheekbones, and intense eyes, Bellamy looks set to become a bona fide pin-up this year. With those looks, the tour of Japan and Australia must surely have yielded some fairly salacious stories. Let s not beat around the bush: what s the Muse groupie count like?
"(laughs) Dom in the band is pretty renowned for that kind of thing," says Bellamy. "He s a got a bit of a reputation already on this tour. But it s not for me to say!"
Not content with straddling the Far East and the South Pacific, Bellamy had barely woken from his slumber in an American hotel when I rang him to do the interview. Muse have been wooing Uncle Sam s white noise-loving nieces and nephews as part of a three-pronged bill that also includes the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Foo Fighters some bitches brew that is when it comes to after-show partying, I d say.
"They re absolutely crazy," says Bellamy "There have been some nights where it s been just insane. When you re as big as they are in America, it s impossible not to have a good night."
Who s the bigger party animals, the Foo Fighters or the Chili Peppers?
"I think the Foo Fighters are on this tour," says Bellamy. "But that s cos some of the Chili Peppers are not really around. Anthony [Kiedis] is really into his health at the moment. And he s got his girlfriend with him.
"But there have been some really memorable moments. We went into this karaoke bar and we were just hanging around outside with Dave Grohl. Then we heard one of the Foo Fighters songs being sung by some guy. So Grohl just ran in. You can imagine what that must have been like to be singing a song and have the guy who wrote it just burst in and grab the microphone and start singing it. The whole place just went mental."
Bellamy is writing material for the second Muse album on the road. He reckons it will see off all those Radiohead comparisons for good and give them a more individual, distinctive sound. So what s Bellamy been listening to while travelling the States hi-ways and by-ways?
"At the moment, I m listening to a lot of music from the 19th century," states Bellamy, "people like Berlioz, Rachmaninov, Brahms. When I m on tour, I find that music the best stuff to listen to when going to bed. It hits different frequencies in your ears. It s very pleasant."
Can we therefore expect a prog rock symphonic opera from Muse in the future?
"(laughs) Maybe in about five albums time. I don t know a lot about prog rock or what it s about but it seems to me that it s stuff musicians do when they ve made enough money that they don t have to worry about getting food, and can solely concentrate on the music.
"It s as if they re bored writing three-minute songs for radio and are more interested in looking into different ways of formulating vibes and the feel of a record. I m sort of into that stuff, but I think sometimes it s an excuse to not write songs.
"Of course, I m sure that I d end up doing that after experimenting with various drugs and selling a million records. But right now, I m not really that into it."
Showbiz is currently available on Mushroom Records. Muse play the Temple Bar Music Centre on May 11th with Elastica, and on the 12th as part of the Trinity Ball.