Muse album covers

Throughout all of Muse's albums artwork they have always kept a sci-fi/space theme.

The first album muse release was called showbiz and and the artwork depicts a woman striding over a baron and strange world with two moons in the background. The glow of the woman draws attention to her and also blurs out the expression on her face so the audienc doesn't know what she may be feeling but with the baron landscape and her being the only being within the picture it connotes a feeling of loneliness and . The mise en scene is the essential visual signifier to the space and sci-fi theme. The secound album, 'Origin of Symmetry' and again is a simple landscape that only consists of a seemingly nevere ending rows of strange antena that connotes paranoid conspiracies of alien activity and spying on space. The third album named 'Hulabaloo' seems to be the only album that does not have any aspects of the mise en scene that depict views of space and also the only to sell the image of the band themselves. The next album once again picks up the space theme and once again thems of paranoia. The cover shows a man with a gas mark looking up to the sky with shadows on the ground. The shadows looking much like that of a human like figure onto the ground that looks much like that of the moon. The paranoia shown with the gas mark and the enigma of what the man is looking up at. The convntion of using an enigma, which is unanswered, is again used in 'Black holes and revelations' which shows 4 men sitting in spacesuit like suits on a landscape that could easily be that of the planet Mars. Their next album 'HAARP' imidietly shows that of the theme with satelites within a black background perhaps depicting space. Their most recent album uses a geometric like hexagonal artwork with a man on a path in space that is leading to Earth. Perhaps a turning back to society and away from the lonely themes that dominated the early album covers due to Muse's change in musical direction to become more mainstream.

For the album 'Black holes and revelations', which in it's title already suggests space themes, all the singles capture a similar style in artwork that mimics that of clusters of stars and galaxies turned into artwork of the band, 'Map of Problematique', a horse in 'Knights of cydonia and a couple about to kiss in 'Invincible'.

The themes of space and sci-fi themes may be due to the band wanting to target their niche potential audience who maybe a demograpahic that are interested in alternative films/TV programmes such as that of the sci-fi and space genre. But also the theme of space is a symbol of loneliness that many of their songs reflect and their potential audience may be able to reflect such feelings of loneliness.