Muse are going full orchestra at Abbey Road — and The Wow! Signal already sounds enormous

Footage and audio snippets from Abbey Road Studios confirm what we suspected: Muse are not making a small record.

The band have been in Studio One — the biggest live room at Abbey Road, the same space used for countless film scores and classic orchestral sessions — recording the string and brass arrangements for The Wow! Signal. The scale of what's being laid down is audible even through phone-camera clips. This is not a few strings dropped over a synth bed. This is full orchestral writing.

What we're actually hearing

The snippets doing the rounds show upwards of forty musicians in the room. There are strings, brass, and what sounds like a full woodwind section. The arrangements aren't decorative. They're load-bearing parts of the tracks, not afterthoughts sprinkled in post-production to add texture.

One clip in particular — reportedly from a track provisionally titled "Meridian" — has the strings driving the main melodic line while brass provides counterpoint underneath. It's compositionally serious. Someone has written actual orchestral music here, not just handed a string quartet some chord sheets.

Matt Bellamy has talked about the album pulling from the kind of wide-screen ambition that defined Origin of Symmetry and Black Holes and Relativities — and if these sessions are the evidence, he means it.

Why Abbey Road matters for this

They could have recorded orchestral parts anywhere. They chose Abbey Road's Studio One specifically because of the room's acoustic character. It has a natural reverb that digital processing cannot replicate properly. When you hear those sessions, you're hearing the room as much as the players.

That choice costs money and time. You book Studio One when you want the sound to be right, not just functional. Muse are treating this album with that level of intention.

The Wow! Signal needs this

Will of the People had moments of real power but leaned hard on straight rock arrangements. Good record. Not a landmark one. The Wow! Signal was always going to need to swing bigger to mean something in 2026, when rock bands at Muse's level are competing for attention in a fragmented market.

The orchestral approach is the right call. Muse have always been at their best when they're building something cinematic. Knights of Cydonia hit the way it did because the production matched the ambition. Same with Uprising, same with Madness. The tracks that land for them are the ones that commit fully.

Going to Abbey Road, filling Studio One with forty-plus musicians, writing arrangements that actually do compositional work — that is committing fully.

The touring question

Muse announced an arena and stadium run to follow the album's release, with UK dates at The O2 and Manchester Co-op Live already confirmed. The orchestral material raises an obvious question about live performance.

Bellamy has hinted at "enhanced production" for the tour. That could mean anything from pre-recorded orchestral beds playing behind the band to bringing a live section on stage. We'd push hard for the latter. Muse live with a real orchestra — even a reduced one — at those venues would be genuinely extraordinary.

If The Wow! Signal is built around this orchestral foundation, the live show needs to honour it. A backing track won't cut it when you've recorded in Studio One.

Our verdict

These Abbey Road sessions are the most exciting thing Muse have done in years. The scale is right. The location is a statement in itself. The footage shows proper orchestral arrangements, not window dressing.

The Wow! Signal has the potential to be the Muse record that reminds everyone why they were untouchable in their peak years. The Abbey Road sessions suggest they know exactly what's required.

We're ready for it.

---
Image via [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muse_(band)) / Wikimedia Commons