Musical and Lyrical themes on The Handler

Matt and Dom on Radio X with John Kennedy, talking about the writing of The Handler.

The Handler contains a mellotron on the chorus and a church organ (!!), "but all that's just in the background" according to Matt. The musical essence of the piece is three mates together in a room (Matt's basement) jamming together like it was when Muse had started. It's Dom's favourite song on the album and the essence of Muse's "back to our roots" efforts on Drones. Dark, slow, heavy.

The production style is similar to Origin of Symmetry or Absolution.

Lyrically it's a lot darker - here Matt goes into the books he read on CIA brainwashing and mind-control operations from the 1940s to the 70s, that he calls "the CIA picking up where Nazi Germany left off".

He also explains the song in context of the narrative of the album, with Matt/Mary gaining awareness of being exploited or controlled, and that being the beginning of their resistance and fight back against "dark forces— in real life, in their head, or wherever you want it to be: I've tried to keep the album a little bit ambiguous so it's not completely in the military world, the fantasy world or the psychology world". Muse really write songs that you can take and make your own, which is why so many people connect with them so strongly.