Song of the Day: Muse - "Stockholm Syndrome"

With song titles like "Apocalypse Please" and "Time is Running Out", Brit rockers Muse ratcheted up the scope of their themed albums with 2003's Absolution. Named after the psychological phenomenon where a hostage forms emotional bonds to the captor, "Stockholm Syndrome" is the desperate centerpiece to Muse's end of the world soundtrack.

The tune kicks off to a roaring start with Dom Howard's thunderously heady drums. Operatic, ascending synth arpeggios and Matthew Bellamy's falsetto float above heavily distorted guitars and Christopher Wolstenholme's hammering bass. And with the way Bellamy sings "This is the last time I'll forget you," on the chorus, it sounds simultaneously like a threat and a lover's promise.

The lazy, well-worn comparisons to Radiohead spring mostly from Bellamy's vocal tendency toward Thom Yorke-isms in his upper register. But while Radiohead's estimable musical importance (and self-importance) is a matter for eager, indulgent discussion among rock critics, Muse strive to make their importance as self-evident as possible. When they do it with such compelling bombast as "Stockholm Syndrome", why bother to argue?