Violet Hill Video Exclusive: Tuesday 13 May On Channel 4

[busybeeburns]

Inexcusable new Coldplay video

 

 

What the fuck? Really. Heads should roll when the biggest band in the world has a new clip that looks like a failed TAFE project.

 

The vid for Coldplay's new single 'Violet Hill' is online and it's a hilarious disaster. The main premise is the band trudging around an Italian mansion and some sort of endless quarry. Carrying shitty guitars and a military drum, the band marionette dance, ponder and conjure up the emotion of being utterly confused and bored at the same time. And I know Chris Martin has gone on before about his love for the Arcade Fire but jeez, do they need to be so blatant about it? The usual black military-style garb has now been replaced by dusty US civil war era military style uniforms. Or Arcade Fire dressed as Adam and the Ants at Halloween.

 

The first 4 seconds are unquestionably the best part of the video - a static shot of a hillside shrouded in shifting cloud shadows, reminiscent of Bjork's 'Joga' clip. Then we see the foursome trudging along another (Violet? Ah I geddit.) hill, just as Chris Martin finger-snaps everyone into place back at the mansion via something from 1982. Before computers. Then we see them with their best vinegar stroke "serious faces" on before Martin, erm, hammers a hammer, towards the camera to denote "serious face reprise". It's like Anton Corbijn cut with the Thunderbirds.

 

At 1:30 we get my very favourite part of the whole mess. I can only imagine as the band, cameramen, boom operators, photographers, directors, label reps, caterers and hangers on, all waiting around while THE DRUMMER STRAINS TO LIFT A ROCK!! What? Pleasingly it seems this point marks the unraveling of the director's mind, as he regresses to tricks learned on rainy days at film school. You can picture the on set CB Radio conversation: "I have no fucking idea, I just said yes cause it was cash upfront. My kid needs a root canal and there's no more car adverts til summer. Now I'm in Italy with Coldplay and oh God...hey! Will, pick up that rock! Um. Shit. Now just hold still, we'll make some flash cuts. Er. ANYONE GOT A MAGNIFYING GLASS?'

 

Cue Martin earnestly examining his teeth while band members thrust unfortunately behind him. This weird vibe is carried to the "funky" middle eight, where they all inexplicably gather around a piano and pump along, poe-faced. The director, his mind now razed from rebuked ideas, failing light and the knowledge that all the intended cool footage shot inside the actual mansion can't be used, thanks to a few accidental smiles caught on film, leaves the second unit assistant to tell the band "just go for it" next to any random inanimate object in sight. Aka anyone not Chris Martin. In fact the call sheet might've looked like:

 

Chris Martin

Rock lifter

Lying down guitar man

That's it

 

Christ. You have unlimited resources, global access to creative minds and all kinds of advanced technologies, yet you come up with this piece of junk? It makes some sense in a way, that as the song grasps for some kind of loose meaning, the video would do the same. But the real crime is that 99% of bands worldwide could have recorded entire discographies with the cash that's gone into this!

 

Walking into the wind!! Random French Horn!!! Argh!! *shoots self*

 

UPDATE: So this video has been pulled from Youtube. Well at least we got the "rock lift" shot off. Maybe they read TheVine? Hi Chris!

 

http://www.thevine.com.au/music/reviews/inexcusable-new-coldplay-video.aspx

[Mimixxx]

Haha, somewhat of an overly dramatic response to the video from whoever wrote that...is just a video :dozey:

[Stefan8]

Indeed, a perfect moment for this smiley: :dozey:

[Jayzo]

What a heated summary of his/her opinions :thinking:

 

(And for overseas people, TAFE is an Australian college type thing)

[RadioMad]

Best part of the video are the black and white shots of the bandmembers.

[::Hayley::]

Walking into the wind!! Random French Horn!!! Argh!! *shoots self*

 

:cry:

ahaahhaahhahhhaahhahaha

Holy crap.

IAN!

I totally thought that you wrote this.

Phew.

I was scared there for a minute :stunned:

[ApproximatelyInfinite]

it's probably already been mentioned about 6 times, but i couldn't really see anything, so i thought i'd say that a friend told me that from 6AM to 11AM on VH1 (in the USA, at least), they're going to be playing "violet hill" every hour (maybe on the hour?). i know we've already all seen it and that there's actually a BETTER one out there on their website, but there are some geeks out there like me who, if we remember, will flick on VH1 just to see it get public airtime :D

 

anyway, sorry if that's been said like 6 times already :rolleyes:

[IneedYou23]

I just saw Violet Hill on VH1 pretty cool!Its always nice to see the boys on tv!!Im pretty sure they are going to play at the top of the hour every hour.Just the first of many Coldplay tv appearences!!

[Flying Sparks]

Sigh, finally saw it now on MTV. And they didn't show it till END at the damn CLIP PREMIERE !! Argh.. They stopped it during Chris' fall in the end. How stupid. But exciting anyway to see it on TV =) Yaay!

[ApproximatelyInfinite]

i woke up too late to see any of the 6-11 showings :sad:

i was counting on them playing it at 11 too, but i wanted to throw something at the TV when "flavor of love" came on, uggh.