After five days of being soaked, chilled to the bone, having everything I owned covered in mud, and drinking enough Tuborg to nearly forget how wet, cold, and dirty I d become - some sunlight was brought to Roskilde on sunday, the last day of what had been a record-setting week of rain at the festival.
Many festival-goers felt let down from the first few days. It had been - with an endless barrage of rain, shin deep mud, and noticable absense of a real show-stealer - a weekend which seemed destined to rank among the less impressive of the over three decades worth of Roskildes. That s not to say there had been no good music up to that point, (Arcade Fire, Arctic Monkeys, The Who, Talib Kweli, Bonde do Role, and The Sounds being some personal favourites, while the Beastie Boys and Queens of the Stone Age weren t nearly as bad as people seemed to think).
But then, along came Muse.
Having only gotten in to them a few months earlier, after being introduced to the song "Bliss", I still considered myself a casual listener of the group. I was familiar mainly with Absolution and Origin of Symmetry , and had previously unknowingly heard them for over a year on the radio, with "Starlight" getting radio rotation here in Canada. However, I left Denmark the next afternoon with a place in my heart (and music collection) for Muse.
From the opening chords on "Knights of Cydonia", to the final "Takk" ("Thanks" in Danish) after "Bliss" (this, and another song, I forget which, were played in the encore, not on the set-list) the show was visually and sonically an amazing experience. I place it up there with seeing Radiohead on the "OK Computer" tour in 1997, as well as the Smashing Pumpkins "Mellon Collie.." tour in 96.
The crowd was receptive, I even noticed a few separate people shed a tear during a couple songs, something I d only witnessed at a concert once, a Lauryn Hill show during her 2002 Unplugged tour.
Muse helped ease everyone s stress away, helped also by the fireworks which coincided with Basement Jaxx performing the last show on the main stage for 2007, but for myself and for many who saw it, Muse was the rock saviour Roskilde needed, and are definitely the best group I saw at the festival. Personal highlights included "Plug In Baby" "Stockholm Syndrome" and the entire crowd clapping in unison during "Starlight", although just about every song they played was performed flawlessly. 9.5/10