1001 Songs Challenge #962: Supermassive Black Hole (2006)

On 11 February 2019 I set myself the challenge of reading 1001 Songs You Must Hear Before You Die by Robert Dimery (ed.) and following the book’s advice to the letter. I’ve previously read 1001 Films… and started 1001 Albums… but felt 1001 Songs… would be a sensible place to start for what I have in mind here.

My challenge is to read about one song per day and listen to it (YouTube and Spotify, I need you tonight!) before sharing my own thoughts. Some songs I will love, others I’ll hate, and I’m sure there will be those that leave me perplexed but listen to them I shall.

I’ll also try, and most likely fail, to pinpoint the best song from the 1001 on offer but I’m nothing if not foolhardy. Instead of one song, I’m predicting I’ll have about 100 favourites by the end and may have to resort to a Top 10 so far to maintain any semblance of sanity.

So long as I post every day (including Christmas) then this challenge should come to an end on Wednesday 8 November 2021. Staying with the Barney Stinson theme I am hoping that the whole experience will prove to be… legendary!

 

Muse – Supermassive Black Hole (2006)

 

 

Goodbye to 2006. We’re leaving the US today, dear reader, and making our way back to the UK. We head for the southwest of England and the county of Devon. Formed in 1994, Muse were a trio that specialised in variants of rock. They began steadily, recording successful albums as they went along but it is in 2006 that we join them. Muse have released their fourth album, Black Holes and Revelations, and from there 1001 Songs have gone with the track, Supermassive Black Hole. 

Supermassive Black Hole was written by lead singer, Matt Bellamy, and appears to concern a narrator who has fallen for someone he probably shouldn’t have but they are hard to resist and he is powerless to put up any kind of fight. The narrator speaks of being firm in their convictions prior to meeting this person, confident that no one could sucker or humiliate them, but now they have met someone they can not get enough of and they don’t know what to do going forward. The song uses analogies of the cosmos with the “black hole” of the title being the pull of gravity this individual has on our poor narrator. 

Muse are another group I am not overly familiar with save the track, Starlight, that I heard years ago and spent years more haunted by because I did not know what it was called or who sang it. When I finally found out and added it to my list on Spotify, it was a good day indeed. Supermassive Black Hole is inferior to Starlight in my opinion but it is still a strong piece and makes me eager to sample even more of the group’s work.

 

Favourite songs so far:

The Animals – House of the Rising Sun (1964)

Simon & Garfunkel – The Sounds of Silence (1965)

The Beatles – A Day in the Life (1967)

The Doors – The End (1967)

Pink Floyd – Wish You Were Here (1975)

Meat Loaf – Bat Out of Hell (1977)

Tracy Chapman – Fast Car (1988)

U2 – One (1991)

Radiohead – Paranoid Android (1997)

Snow Patrol – Run