Review Summary: Why?
Origin of Symmetry is Muse's best album. I'm not sure many will argue with that, especially after the embarrassments the band have been putting out in the last five years or so. It makes sense, therefore, for Muse to remix and remaster their magnum opus twenty years on, so we can hear it in its modern, fuzzy glory.
Except that isn't what has happened. Muse have tinkered with practically everything and, almost invariably, it sounds inferior to the original 2001 release. Levels are all over the place, some instruments are drowned out completely, and others are so prominent, despite fading nicely into the mix twenty years ago.
The clean guitar in Citizen Erased is now bathed in effects that lessen the impact it had, originally cutting through the fuzz of the first third of the song. The chorus of Dark Shines is frustratingly clean, not the carefully manufactured chaos it once was. The main riff of New Born lacks any power at all, with the rhythm guitar pushed to the wayside in leiu of bass and drums, which are by far the worst thing about this dreadful remaster.
Dom Howard's drums are nothing short of awful in Origin of Symmetry XX. Perfectly clean and dry, they cut through everything with clinical precision, which would be fine if they didn't sound so
bad. Where the drums were once a part of a bigger sound, they are now front and centre, and sound so much worse for it. The snare would give St. Anger a run for its money, the cymbals are empty and lifeless, and the toms are so unnecessarily deep that they overpower everything around them. It's a mess.
Muse in 2021 seem to have not only forgotten what made their music good twenty years ago, but what made their music
sound good twenty years ago. Remaster albums are always hit and miss, especially when the sound of the original was as unique as Origin of Symmetry was, but Muse appear to have done everything in their power to make the closest they have to a genuine classic sound amateurish. There is no reason to listen to Origin of Symmetry XX. Even die-hard defenders of the album will be bitterly disappointed. The only saving grace of this remaster is that it reminded me of how good the sound of the original Origin of Symmetry is. Was that the point?
