Completely absolved

A sold-out show; a line out the door, down the street, and all the way through the opening band's set.

It takes just three Brits to make Buffalo rock.

English rock trio Muse packed the Sphere Thursday night for the MTV Campus Invasion tour. The band's European-inspired rock threw the audience back to the glory days of English metal bands.

The supporting act, Razorlight, played to a fraction of the crowd as fans filed in the narrow door, past security and pat-downs. The band's guitar-driven melodies are reminiscient of old school indie rock - when the term actually meant something. Razorlight whet the pallets of the audibly and visually anxious crowd.

A laborious set change had teams of professionals changing chords and shifting equipment. The audience was completely unaware of the atmosphere the worker with the light strapped to his head was creating.

An intense light show of blue and white amplified every beat and pitch. Gel filters soaked the stage with oily rainbow lights. Vibrant spots kept perfect time as Muse pumped out old stand-bys, and shiny new hits from their 2004 album, "Absolution." The stage was spacey and futuristic with the signature keyboard lit up and ironclad.

Behind the head, over the edge of the stage, guitar solos and spot on jams saturated the Euro-dance remixes of the album material. The keyboard was concert-pianist quality. Those guys have superhuman fast hands. When they played "Time is Running Out" the audience sang the chorus unaided.

The miracle of Muse is the virtuosity of the musicians. The guitarist uses his instrument as a source of electric sound, using dissonance and distortion to his musical advantage. They use everything they're provided with to accentuate the melody and feeling they are trying to convey. The lights were spectacular, coordinating in color and time. Muse creates texture and dimension that transcends an average musical performance of any genre.

Near the end of the show, several huge balloons filled with confetti were dropped into the crowd. As one strayed too far on stage, it was picturesquely speared by the end of a guitar, which unleashed its contents over the entertainers and the entertained.

Muse does for live shows what so many modern bands have forgotten. They spend not a minute on stage simply playing their recorded songs. It is a live show meant to feature the intricate music, not a flashy rock persona.

However, what's with MTV? Kudos for bringing a progressive and not purely commercial band to the table, but isn't it the Campus Invasion Tour? An event so named should be held on a campus of some sort. With the plethora of college campuses in Buffalo, it seems slightly insulting to hold it at a privately owned club run by a former Clear Channel employee. Apparently even music for music's sake can't escape the commercial death-grip.

Muse sings for absolution, but many of us are still left searching for their sins.