Knights of Cydonia

Half way through the eight tracks for my Desert Island Discs and this one is a family entry, as it would probably be in the final eight for both my sons as well as me.

The song is by Muse, an English (prog) rock band from Teignmouth in Devon. It appears on their fourth (and big league breakthrough album), Black Holes and Revelations. The album marked a step change in the "sound" of Muse in that it introduced differing musical styles while remaining true to their rock roots. This resulted in two hit singles before this track, at 6 minutes and 7 seconds was the unlikely, but popular,  third choice. It is the band's "Bohemian Rhapsody" albeit , it didn't stay at number one for nine weeks!

The songs starts with a driving rock instrumental section. which owes a debt of gratitude to "Telstar" by The Tornados, before the vocals kick in (after 2 minutes). This leads to an acapella vocal section around the lyrics "no one gonna take me alive" which has swirling keyboards in the background, these are added to with bass and drums which slowly builds to "the heads down no nonsense head banging riff".

In the film Mike Myers film "Wayne's World", there is classic scene, where Wayne & Garth and two friends are driving in a car all listening to Bohemian Rhapsody. When the the heavy rock end section of the song kicks in, they all "headbang" in unison. The final section of this song has the same effect on me! It is a glorious heavy rock ending to a great track, albeit if you listen to "Emerald" by Thin Lizzy it does again bear a passing resemblance.

On the original album this track was the final one and it ended the album on a real high ( sadly, a Japanese bonus track now appears at the end of most versions of the Album) It also ended the subsequent live shows when Muse toured and the sight of the whole of Wembley stadium rocking in unison at the end of the song is a sight to behold!

It's a song that I never tire of hearing and if comes on the radio, you have to turn it up! You can listen to it here