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Black Holes and Revelations

2006 album by Muse

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 18, 2026
Entity authorityQ204240
Source-derived summary

Black Holes and Revelations is the fourth studio album by the English rock band Muse. It was released on 3 July 2006 through Warner Bros. Records and Helium-3. It was produced by Rich Costey over four months in London, Milan, New York City, and southern France.

The album saw a change in style for Muse, with influences including Depeche Mode, Millionaire, Lightning Bolt, Sly and the Family Stone, and music from southern Italy. Like their previous albums, it features political and dystopian themes, with lyrics covering topics such as political corruption, alien invasion, revolution and New World Order conspiracies, as well as more conventional love songs.

Black Holes and Revelations entered the charts at number one in five countries, including the UK, and in the top 10 in several other countries, including the US. It was certified quadruple platinum in the UK and platinum in the US. "Supermassive Black Hole" and "Knights of Cydonia" entered the top 10 of the UK singles chart, while "Starlight", "Map of the Problematique" and "Invincible" reached the top 25. As of 2018, Black Holes and Revelations had sold more than 4.5 million copies worldwide.

Black Holes and Revelations received positive reviews and appeared on several lists of the year's best albums. It was nominated for the Mercury Prize and appeared in the 2007 version of 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Black Holes and Revelations” is 2006 album by Muse. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Black, Holes and Revelations, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewBest approached as a cultural-object dossier: authorship and date matter, but circulation and reception often explain the wider significance. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2006, 2018, 2007, 1001—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 2006-06-03. For this dossier, Black, Holes and Revelations is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “2006 album by Muse” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q204240. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2006, 2018, 2007 and 1001.

Critical limits

Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Black Holes and Revelations”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Black Holes and Revelations primary sources, Black Holes and Revelations archive and Black research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Black Holes and Revelations”?
  2. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
  3. Which edition, object, performance or recording is being described?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Black Holes and Revelations” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.