03 HYSTERIA ABSOLUTION (2003)

Acontender for the best song called Hysteria ever written, this is probably the Muse song your bassist most wants to cover. Absolution was the album that lifted Muse to arena level, and Hysteria was the song that got musicians talking. Naturally, it’s Chris Wolstenholme’s gargantuan bass riff that gets a lot of the attention, but there’s no shortage of guitar excitement. Bellamy’s whammy bar nudges enhance the chorus powerchords, and the sequence of octaves and bends he plays over the main riff is almost as iconic as the bass riff itself. The most fun part is the monstrous variation on the main riff that comes after the second and third choruses, where guitar and bass sync up to make one giant tone. The solo is comprised of two parts – the first where notes are double picked on the higher strings up around the 14th fret and the final part which consists of C, G, Dm and Am triads ringing out from the same area high up the neck.