Albums

Coldplay
Viva la Vida or Death and all His Friends

I have always been a big fan of Coldplay ever since the days of "Yellow." And last month Alt Nation 21 featured a week of
"Coldplay Nation" which enabled me to hear their new album in it's entirety. I really like this album and have been listening to it everyday for the past week. A lot of critics have been down on the album saying it's "unpredictable," "uninteresting," "too pretentious," "bipolar," that it "disgusts sophisticates," that it should've been better since Eno produced it, or that the band just tried too hard and didn't deliver anything magical. Pretty harsh eh? Maybe these people are just over analyzing the music. There doesn't have to be some deep meaning behind the music and it doesn't have to stand for something. Sometimes it just has to sound good. I rarely listen to the lyrics of a song when I first hear it. If it sounds good then I'll eventually learn the lyrics of the song because I'll end up playing it over and over enough times. I think Coldplay has some good songs. Most of their melodies are enjoyable and I can see why a lot of people like them. Although, Andy Gill offers a different perspective. In his review he writes, "The strange thing is, I can't seem to find anyone who bought X & Y, or who intends to buy Viva La Vida. For that matter, I have never encountered one person who has a kind word to say about Coldplay. None of my personal or professional acquaintances, nobody in the street or the local café, not a single soul will admit to liking Coldplay or purchasing their music. Indeed, most seem to agree that they epitomise everything that's wrong with modern rock music. So who's buying all their albums?" That's a good question Gill, considering that they've sold millions of records around the globe and play at sold out concerts whenever they tour. I'm not saying Coldplay is the greatest band ever, and I'm not about to compare them to Radiohead (which some people have felt the need to do,) but stop analyzing the music so much people and just listen. You might find that it doesn't sound half bad. This fellow reader made a good point: "Don't you realise there's nothing new under the Sun... I'm not ashamed. Its such a Perfect Day, I'm not lost..I'm over 42 and I once walked a cemetery In London. I'm an escapist...especially when it comes to Coldplay. Can we not just just enjoy the fact that we can enjoy music without knowledge? Just by opening our ears..its amazing how we can be totally honest and say we love or hate something. We don't have to follow the ear of someone else who hates or loves the same things each of us do. When you write from powerful media platforms...do you realise that you put stigma's into people's heads? Lets all be free and just enjoy what our ears tell our brains we like...I don't really care what ENO, The Beatles or U2 think. They're entitled to their opinion and so are we! Please don't foist guilt trips on those of us who are free to hear what we like!" Anyway, I like most of the songs on this new album, especially Cemetaries, Lost, Yes, Violet Hill and Strawberry Swing. The song I could live without is the song the album is titled after, Viva la Vida. Didn't much like that particular track, but the rest were good, definitely not unbearable like the critics make it out to be. But go ahead and listen for yourself and tell me what you think.