Muse bassist Chris Wolstenholme has opened up to NME about his struggles with alcohol and the impact it’s had on his life, both personally and professionally. As reported by Ultimate Guitar, Wolstenholme’s addiction reached a life-threatening level as Muse attempted to record their 2009 record The Resistance, with fellow members Matthew Bellamy and Dom Howard often left to work without their bassist.
“Drinking all day every day is pretty bad. It’s when you start getting to that point where you realise you can’t function without it, where you wake up in the morning shaking and the first thing you do is go to the fridge and down a bottle of wine. That’s how bad it was. I was incredibly unhealthy, overweight, a mess,” Wolstenholme told NME.
“You’ve got anxiety 24 hours a day, you feel your f–king life’s about to end, you’re very scared but you don’t know what you’re scared of.”
“There was only two ways to go: die in a few years or stop. The same happened to my dad; he was 40 when he died. I’d just turned 30 and it was that realisation that if I go the same way I could be dead in ten years. Ten years is not a long time.”
With the assistance of a cognitive behavioural therapist, Wolstenholme overcame his alcoholism and in turn seized upon the ordeal to pen two new tracks that will appear on Muse’s upcoming album The 2nd Law. The songs Save Me and Liquid State come towards the end of the record and both feature Wolstenholme’s vocals.
“Both of those lyrics were written at that time when I’d stopped drinking. ‘Liquid State’ was written about the person you become when you’re intoxicated and how the two of them are having this fight inside of you and it tears you apart. ‘Save Me’ was about having the family, the wife and kids and, despite all that crap that I’ve put them through, at the end of it you realise they’re still there and they’re the ones who pulled you through,” explained Wolstenholme.
The 2nd Law by Muse is due out September 17th, 2012.
Muse – The 2nd Law – Track List:
1.Supremacy
2.Madness
3.Panic Station
4.Prelude
5.Survival
6.Follow Me
7.Animals
8.Explorers
9.Big Freeze
10.Save Me
11.Liquid State
12.The 2nd Law: Unsustainable
13.The 2nd Law: Isolated System
