OK, this is really, really sloppy. I hope to have a more coherent version blogged on my personal blogs tomorrow or so if anyone wants to check that at a later point. And I'll post my pictures once they're sent to me! :D

 

 

 

 

I got to the boat early. I didn’t go to the pub because I just needed to make sure I was in the right place at the right time, and I knew everyone would come over soon anyway. The boat was parked (do you park boats?) at the pier, and I could see people setting up, but no one else was around. Other Coldplayers started to trickle in and we made our introductions. News had come only hours before arriving that not only would we not be able to Tweet on the boat, but we would not be able to take pictures, either. This was heartbreaking news, but Debs (DEBS!!!) took all our cameras and phones at the door. At this point I thought the band would still be there at some point, so I was a bit sad, but really my excitement overshadowed all of that.

 

Once we were all on the boat, which took AGES (100 is a lot of people, you know), two guys with a megaphone started to talk to us. They were PAs for a film crew, and they informed us that we were to be part of Coldplay’s next music video. Which a lot of us had guessed in the past week, but it was a lovely surprise nonetheless.

 

We had to sign really, really intense contracts. The first was about them using our image in any way they want. The second was a confidentiality agreement, saying that EMI would find us and kill us if we even talked about this before Wednesday, when the video and song come out. In the end they called EMI and overturned that one, so this is all legal, me posting all this.

 

They played us “Christmas Lights.” It’s very Coldplay, very Viva, but just so great. I teared up the first time I heard it. We had to learn how to sing a bit in the middle, which is very similar to the VIVA chant, so we practiced that about 400 times.

 

And then we all bundled up and went to the top, open-air deck of the boat. We were driven to South Bank on the boat, between the OXO Tower and the National Theatre, where a film set was set up and Coldplay were. The boat was anchored a bit offshore, so we couldn’t see anything of the guys or the set besides the camera shooting us and the lights on us, but it was thrilling anyway. We were each given a balloon, and were instructed to let go of them at a specific point in the song we were singing along to (which they will actually track onto the song, they recorded us singing thousands of times with huge mics). We did four takes over the course of two hours. It was kind of a riot: being told hundreds of times “LET GO OF THE BALLOON ON THE FOURTH ‘OHH’” and “THIS IS JUST A REHEARSAL, DO NOT LET GO OF YOUR BALLOON ON THIS ONE.” It was freezing and we were all politely cutthroat about being at the railing so we’d be visible, but it was just a blast. I was in the very front for all but one take, so I think I’m going to be pretty visible in the video. It was cold and a bit like being in school, but I thought it was epic fun, no matter what other people say.

 

Afterwards, they opened the bar and set up Coldplay karaoke and it was a very nice party. I had a pint, which would damn me later. I didn’t take very many pictures or anything—we didn’t have our cameras or phones most of the time anyway. It was nice to just talk to so many of the people I’ve known only through the internet, or only through meetings at concerts, for years. It’s also a shame, though, because there’s so much going on and so many people that you just can’t talk to everyone. I missed out on really talking to a bunch of people. But I would like to say that I love Debs Wild. This is not news, but she’s just such a nice person, and so lovely to talk to. I got a shite picture with her, and she’s just so adorable. I want to be Debs Wild.

 

We pulled back into the pier around 10. A few of us (me, Anna, Jamie, and Daniel come to mind first) decided to go back to South Bank on the off chance the band was still shooting. We, or I should say I, wasn’t getting my hopes up. We walked along the river for about half an hour to get to where the shoot was (I have a stupidly keen sense of direction) and the scenery and security were still there and everything, and we freaked out. They let us watch as long as we didn’t take pictures, again, for confidentiality reasons.

 

I was on a live film set from 11 at night til 3 in the morning with Coldplay. I saw the entire thing being shot, I know every word of “Christmas Lights” now. Regardless of who was in the shoot and what they were filming, it was FASCINATING to see how a real film set works. I could never be an actor, or a musician, or anyone who has to do all that over and over and over. Nerves were frayed, from crew and band alike, I think. They were running hours late and there were technical problems and sound problems, but it’s not like it was all a shambles, either: I think this is just how film sets run. There were BRILLIANT takes that made me just hug myself for how much I love these guys.

 

Phil came over and talked to us for a while, a good while. We talked about the boat and he answered some Coldplay-related questions for us, like how he came up with the name “Politik” (he was impressed we knew that he was the one that did: it’s from Karl Marx’s realpolitik, which isn’t exactly hard to work out). He said he meant to be on the boat with us, but got asked to be in the video instead. I said that made total sense, but I was actually looking forward to the Q&A with him, and he apologized and I said there was no need to, because we were talking now.But what a nice man. Oh my gosh.

 

It was also FUCKING FREEZING. Well, I mean, I have a very high tolerance for cold, so I’ve been colder, but it was not comfortable. My bigger problem was that I had to pee, and had since 10 when we left the boat and I downed a pint. All I wanted was a toilet, honestly.

 

I waited from about 10 to about 2, when really nice crew people that gave us handwarmers told me where a public toilet was. I ran to it. It was locked. I came back, the security guards told me how to break into the one at the OXO tower. I ran there. I couldn’t do it: the codes they gave me for the keypads were behind padlocked gates. And I had a sinking feeling in my stomach that I was missing what I waited all those hours for. I’m psychic like that.

 

I ran back, still bursting for a loo. I saw the others walking away from the scene, and I just knew they’d met the band. They looked at me and said “we’re really sorry…Chris came out and hugged us and signed things and took a group picture.” And I saw the autographs in their hands and I just couldn’t believe that I missed him. Daniel and Graham stayed with me as the others left, and the three of us were standing at the side barrier near the stage as I was feeling my chance slip away from me. I got upset. I’m not really a crier, so I didn’t cry or anything, but my heart just broke a bit.

 

Apparently Chris Martin saw my heart breaking. He waved at me from the stage a few meteres away and shouted “HI!” and I waved back and said something like “I’m sorry to distract you, I’m just sad I needed the toilet when you came around to speak to everyone and missed you!” and he said “Well you know how it is: when you gotta go you gotta GO!” and I laughed and made the poor choice of saying back “but I didn’t even go! Everywhere’s closed! AGH!” and he said something like “oh God, I’m sorry, that’s terrible!” He was drawn back into filming again, but I felt a bit better about things, even if I did just have a conversation about my bladder with Chris Martin. I was ready to just leave only half sad, but Graham and Daniel said they wanted to stay on anyway to see if they could meet the rest of the band. I was hesitant, because Chris already saw me being upset that I missed him and I was embarrassed, but I stayed. When he got a free minute about 10 minutes later, he came over to talk to me to make up for it. I think I behaved myself rather well this time. But he made eye contact with me when he shook my hand, and it sounds so disgustingly obsessive and girly to say, but I did wither a bit when I saw how blue his eyes really were. I like, had to look away. He shook my hand and asked my name and said “hey Chelsea, I think I signed your book,” and sure enough, when I’d been on my toilet adventure, Daniel got my Roadie book signed for me from him, with my name and everything. So I got a picture with him…it didn’t come out, but I’ll post it later anyway. I think I could tell he was just tired and ready to go home, and I felt bad taking him away from set for a silly fan picture, but he was just so, so nice despite all that. These guys are such good people.

 

I was ready to be satisfied with that, but I stayed on with Graham and Daniel to catch the rest of the band. And catch them we did. Around 3AM, a bunch of cars pulled round to the back of the set, so we went back there. Guy came out first—he looked worse for wear and was a bit cheesed off and in a rush to get out of there, but he was still so, so nice. I didn’t push him to sign my book, though. Jonny was next: oh, what a lovely man he is. HE SHAVED THE HOBO BEARD, girls. It’s regular scruff now. He seemed excited that we were some of the ones on the boat from earlier, and apologized for the cold, saying he couldn’t believe we’d been out there so long. And then Will. Oh, Will. Will is the nicest man ever. He came right over to us and hugged me and asked us a bit about the boat and took pictures with us and signed things, and acted nothing like he’d spent all night playing the same thing over and over and making nice to the camera over and over. To him, it was 11AM in the morning after a good night’s sleep, not 3AM after working all night. I apologized for keeping him from getting in the car to go home and he just looked at me right in the eye and laughed and said “there’s nothing to be sorry about, you’ve just been in our video for us, this is the least I can do,” or very close to that. The sincerity made me wilt in sheer love.

 

Daniel has the pictures of me with the other three on his camera, so I’ll post them when he sends them to me (and I still have his signed picture as collateral! SORRY, DANIEL! I forgot to get it out of my bag for you), but they all seemed to come out well besides the Chris one, which is just hilariously bad. The Will one was especially cute: he reached over the barrier to put his arms around me.

 

Simon Pegg was there too; he’s in the video. We only shouted hi at him and he waved and asked us how we were, but that’s OK. God, I love that man too. Anyone who knows me knows how obsessed with him and Edgar Wright and Nick Frost I am.

 

I know I haven’t talked about the details of the video shoot or anything: I will say that it’s reminiscent of the LiTii video, minus the puppets, with an old-fashioned stage and kind of a panto-like setup with confetti and fireworks. And the boys wear suits. Real suits and ties. And there’s some awesome camera work going on: Chris rises up from the floor like Frankenstein at the beginning. But they didn’t want details of the shoot itself getting out, so I’m not going to go into great detail about it. People will probably be cranky about that, but we’re all going to get to see it Wednesday, and I’d like to respect their wishes, as they were so gracious to us throughout the whole day, INCLUDING the boat with the drinks that it was “ridiculous” we had to pay for etc etc. I don’t want to enter all the drama I’ve been seeing bits of tonight, but honestly, guys, can we be grateful for what we got? I’d still say the same thing if I hadn’t hung around on set all night and talked to the boys, too. It’s amazing what we got to do, open bar or no open bar, meeting the band or not meeting the band (and I will tell you that the film set was so behind and stressful that they couldn’t have possibly gotten away to meet us—it’s about logistics rather than desire to be there). I know I was one of the ones convinced that the band would be there, and I turned out to be dead wrong, and I’m sorry if I got anyone’s hopes up by talking about it. But when nothing’s promised or confirmed, I don’t think we can turn around and say we deserved to have it when we don’t know all the circumstances behind why things happened the way they did.

 

 

 

 

WARNING: VERY, VERY LONG.

 

WOW!!!! So happy for all of you!!!! :D :D :D

DP!

After the boat I went down to the South bank at 10:30 and waited 3 hours in the freezing cold. My patience was rewarded at 1:30 when Chris and Phill came over bearing gifts of signed photos of the entire band, as well as a personalised note from Chris and a photo op. Will post more pics etc later...now i'm off to work.....going to be a long day.

Chelsea I'm so glad you got to meet them.Wish I'd stayed but I really couldn't.I'm so tired right now, don't know how I'm gonna function at work today.I woke up with Christmas Light in my head.hehehe

Aww am glad you guys who stuc it out got rewarded! :D

 

I lasted an hour before giving in to the cold. Good on you guys!! :nice:

I'M SO HAPPY FOR ALL OF YOU!!!

AND I AM SO MUCH MORE EXCITED FOR THE CHRISTMAS LIGHTS RELEASE ON WEDNESDAY!

AH.

COLDPLAY.

YOU'RE SO GOOD TO YOUR FANS.

:dance:

OK wait, I think I just remembered something, maybe. The guys with me might have to verify later.

 

I think he asked my name, and I told him, and he said he signed my book. And then I think he said "I'm Chris."

 

This strikes me as very funny.

 

"I'm Chris."

 

Oh darn, I was actually here to see the pope. Easy to mistake you for him.

 

I wish I had been a little more DEDICATED now and followed you lot back to the shoot when we got off of the boat instead of going to the Pub... Don't think I could of ever lasted another 3 hours out in those conditions though!

Thank for the loooovely review Chelsea!!!! I was grining during all the time I read it!

I mean, this is major! You guys are going to be on a oldplay video! :dance:

And you had the cance to see a bit of their work, know the rew and the band! You´re right, theres NOTHING to complain about, just LOTS to be gratefull.

AH.

COLDPLAY.

YOU'RE SO GOOD TO YOUR FANS.

:dance:

 

^THAT!!!!!!:wacky:

I wish I had been a little more DEDICATED now and followed you lot back to the shoot when we got off of the boat instead of going to the Pub... Don't think I could of ever lasted another 3 hours out in those conditions though!

 

As this didn't happen till 1.30am, we made the right decision by shooting straight off, as we were very tired and had a train to catch.

If we had heard the band had emerged after an hour or so, we would have been gutted, of course.

I've read through everything posted about the night on the Thames, pro and con. And I'm still on the "pro" side.

 

The memory that will stick with me for a long time will be of the excitement that flew around that boat when they told us we were going to be in the video. THAT to me was worth the 3500 mile trip and the God knows how many dollars it took for me to get here.

 

And the next memory will be of the feeling that I got listening to "Christmas Lights" for the first time. I got a lump in my throat. It is a beautiful song and I hope it gets to be one of those songs that is played on the radio at Christmastime for eons to come.

 

And I got to be in the video for it. I got to sing on the song (does that make any sense?).

 

No bitterness or bad feelings here. I feel like one of the luckiest people in the world.

 

And I'm totally thrilled for those who braved the cold and got to meet them later! What lovely stories about lovely people.

 

I think I'll go walk around London for a little while now and maybe sing "Oh-oh-oh-oh" under my breath.

I´m very happy for all of you,

and don´t know how to wait till Wednesday!!!!:bomb:

I just hope that Coldplay know that we all appreciate them allowing people who love their music the most to get involved with events like this.

 

I also hope everyone who was there really enjoyed and appreciated the gesture, and I hope something similar happens again in the future. I really really wish I could have been there.

Massively jealous! I'm only an hours train journey away from London but I missed out on this vital news somehow. Can't wait for Wednesday and to see you guys in the video!

Epic review Chelsea! Wish I had been there :(

I've read through everything posted about the night on the Thames, pro and con. And I'm still on the "pro" side.

 

I agree, but perhaps like a lot of other people I had built it up a bit too much in my mind. The highlights for me were hearing the new song and spending an evening with a group of pleasant, like minded people. I felt our involvement in the shoot was rather minimal though and at the start of the evening when we told about the schedule I had envisaged that we would get to see some of the band's parts/performance in the vid at least. Saying that though, I am of course extremely grateful to have to gone along and wouldn't have wanted to not be involved in any event like this... bring on the 19th now! :D

Not rude, just facts. If you don't like them just ignore them.

 

Miller was never coming, nor was Phil; they obviously had to both be at the video shoot, it was a smokescreen. We were told as much almost as soon as we got on the boat, so we were obviously 'tricked' on those. Not sure about Matt, but it fits the pattern.

 

Anyway I'm done with Twisted Logic. I was there, many of us were. We all know what went down.

 

Think about it from their point of view. Had they announced it was a video shoot they know the nature of this forum and it would have been Tweeted and Facebooked round the blogosphere and half of London would have turned up and ruined the shoot. It's the nature of the beast nowadays. The schedules for shooting of some of our top TV shows are treated like National Top Secrets nowadays to avoid hoardes of people in the background ruining the shoot/ shouting.

 

It was disappointing however though not to get to meet the band or get a signed copy of the single. Perhaps they will send us something, or invite just us 100 to a little Chirstmas party of theirs?

WHOA,[/size]

I just went through all the pages from today.

 

I just want you people to know that even though I am not often here and I don't post a lot, I am always sharing your exitement, your confusion, your disapointements and your joy!

 

That being said, I am another sad fan who would give practically anything to have been there in London, on the Thames, today. :rolleyes:

 

AND I CAN'T WAIT FOR NEWWWWWWWWS

 

It's just like me:) My level of English stops me every time i try to express myself:(;) Love you guys and those who were there are so lucky:) Beeing on Coldplaying.com gives me something more- like- almost - beeing on that boat:)

It was disappointing however though not to get to meet the band or get a signed copy of the single. Perhaps they will send us something, or invite just us 100 to a little Chirstmas party of theirs?

 

I agree, I think we could (well i thought we would) have a got a little CD. But that's a nice thought yes, they took our addresses down so maybe a little pressie or invite is coming in the post?... :rolleyes:

I agree, I think we could (well i thought we would) have a got a little CD. But that's a nice thought yes, they took our addresses down so maybe a little pressie or invite is coming in the post?... :rolleyes:

 

 

I sound greedy now! :embarrassed:

.

Perhaps, but I think some people's expectations were FARRRRRRRRRRR too high,

 

I totally agree. Obviously the vast majority of Coldplayers there (including myself) were hoping certain things might happen (such as the band putting in an appearance), but it's always better not get your hopes up too much, as there's a very good chance you'll end up disappointed.;)

 

 

WE WERE IN A GOD DAMN COLDPLAY MUSIC VIDEO.

and people are complaining because they didn't get to see phil?

It's just bugging me, tonight was just about the best night ever for a coldplay fan!

 

Spot on. I really can't believe there's so much whinging going on. I thought it was a fantastic, unique experience, that many other people on here would have loved to have been able to participate in.

 

The only slight criticism I had was to do with what happened after the shoot, when I think the karaoke could have been extended with a bit more planning.

Everyone seemed to appreciate that, and it created a great atmosphere, but it was over after only a handful of songs, and after it finished, it was all a bit of an anticlimax.

I think some free cans of cola could easily have been provided too.

 

I also think it wouldn't have been too much of a problem to hand out a signed photo to everyone who attended as a "thank you". After, there were only a hundred of us, and far more than that would be signed at official "signing sessions".

I'm sure everyone would have been more than happy with that.

 

These are only very small points though, and all the planning and logistics involved in actually getting to the boat on time was definitely worthwhile.

By the way, Jamie, it was genuinely great to meet you!:D

 

Exactly. I understand people want to post their opinions, but I hope in doing so they don't ruin any future opportunities for the rest of us! They didn't have to do anything to be honest, and I don't want them to perceive us as being ungrateful for what we got.

 

Good point.

 

Perfect example of the logistics involved and how people will start complaining without knowing the whole story!

 

There is an awful lot of conclusion-jumping that goes on, unfortunately.:dozey:

AllI have to say is that I'm still on cloud 10000000000 for being in a Coldplay video. How many fans of any band can say that, uh?

AllI have to say is that I'm still on cloud 10000000000 for being in a Coldplay video. How many fans of any band can say that, uh?

 

Exactly! A once-in-a-lifetime experience, without a doubt, which should be cherished by all involved.:cool:

AllI have to say is that I'm still on cloud 10000000000 for being in a Coldplay video. How many fans of any band can say that, uh?

 

My thoughts exactly! Loved the evening. As I said it was disappointing not to see the band, but that is an indication of how much we all love the band, not whinging

 

I was on cloud 9 last night and enjoyed every minute of it.

They may should have brought McGinn, Miller and Phil. I always said I'd be happy whith what we're being offered and I honestly think that the video shoot was even better than that. I had a fantastic evening and got to talk to some very nice people. The whole atmosphare was amazing! And everytime I'll see this video in the forthcoming years (This beautiful song's gonna be of of the greatest Christmas hits ever, I suppose) it will remember me of the great time I had there and it's just awesome that we've been a part of that. And please don't argue on the basis of expectations. We had the choice to go there or not and we shouldn't go ONLY for the hope of meeting someone else there they haven't announced. I also don't understand why we need more thread than one for this kind of discussion.

 

I think when the video's released we'll al be happy to see it. We might still get the chance to meet the roadies and Phil someday but this experience yesterdaz was unique. Say your opinions but please don't undervalue what we actually got.