[2016-07-03] Friends Arena, Stockholm, Sweden

[cheeetaz]

Watching germany-italy in an irish pub in stockholm. Europe. [emoji106]

 

 

 

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[Krizer]

So, my boat arrived to Stockholm at ~6.30 am, and I went pretty much right away to check Grand Hotel, waited until ~10.30, no signs of Coldplay there... Then I'll start queuing after Hotel check-in. Is anybody there already? :)

[cheeetaz]

So, my boat arrived to Stockholm at ~6.30 am, and I went pretty much right away to check Grand Hotel, waited until ~10.30, no signs of Coldplay there... Then I'll start queuing after Hotel check-in. Is anybody there already? :)

 

Planning on being there around 1pm.

 

 

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[nancyk58]

Have a wonderful day and evening incl. Coldplay concert. Stockholm is a beautiful city so enjoy it. Yes, I think that Tove Lo might be there. Have fun!

 

I am going on Tuesday 5 July in Parken, Copenhagen. Can't wait.

[nancyk58]

Maybe Tove Lo in stage for singing Fun

 

Yes, that would be FUN. (no pun intended! Or maybe). lol

[cheeetaz]

I'm there. And they are giving out numbers again, throwback to munich 2014.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[Batman]

I'm there. And they are giving out numbers again, throwback to munich 2014.

 

 

 

 

 

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Woah wow that venue looks so clean and tidy! :stunned:

[cheeetaz]

Woah wow that venue looks so clean and tidy! :stunned:

 

U should see their bathrooms, it's the most relaxing and comfortable experience i've ever had.

 

 

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[zorbaflip]

Hello.

My name is Pedro from Luxembourg.

Can anyone please can buy the AHFOD hat from the merchandise stand.

I am a collector and i need this one.

I pay the shipping cost to here.

Please anyone?

All the best.

[cheeetaz]

One hour till doors open

 

 

 

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[Krizer]

I'm in!!!!!! Such a mess (we were not let go inside in time, and those numbers didn't work too well at gate 2 atleast) and soooo much waiting.

 

OMG, I'm not prepared for this:bliss::dance:[ATTACH=full]5004[/ATTACH]

[cheeetaz]

Inside, an hour later than advertised.

 

 

 

 

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[cheeetaz]

More than happy with my space. Will be able to greet the guys when they are walking to the C Stage later. And we will have complete darkness during the whole gig. Should be a great atmosphere. All ready for my 7th and final show [emoji108]

 

 

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[cheeetaz]

Wow, Miller just walked by out of nowhere and i was to surprised to react to it.

 

 

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[Ati ʍᵪ]

Wow, Miller just walked by out of nowhere and i was to surprised to react to it.

 

 

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I need Turkey and Bagdat talking. Video?

[cheeetaz]

How swedish people recycle

 

 

 

 

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[Maslina]

wow...i feel bad now..i would probably take them all back home....cccccc....shame on me! bad, bad girl!

[nancyk58]

http://www.aftonbladet.se/nojesbladet/musik/rockbjornen/article23109851.ab

 

Soon there will be a review of the concert at Aftonbladet.se/nojesbladet. And there is also an interview with the band. I am doing a translation of the interview (to speed up the process Google Translate will be applied).

 

The interview with Coldplay before the show

 

Coldplay: Probably never been better

Nöjesbladet met one of the world’s hottest bands before the concert in Sweden

 

Coldplay had a real crisis and were fighting (against) lack of self confidence.

 

Today they say that they are better than ever.

 

– We should love to continue so long the universe allows us to live, says Chris Martin.

 

Coldplay has never been in a better phase than now. The successful band celebrates 20 years together and have passed a number of different phases. Among them a difficult / serious crisis of lack of confidence.

 

Nöjesbladet met singer Chris Martinand guitar player Jonny Bucklandbefore their sold-out concert at Friends Arena in Solna. But the path to the world’s biggest arenas has not been easy. After the album ”X&Y” from 2005 the band ended in a slump. A deep crisis of lack of selfconfidence with a lot of pressure.

 

– When we were most chaotic and unorganised, we felt the pressure from our record company, commercial pressure. We decided not to care about that kind of pressure. It is not so healthy, says Chris Martin.

 

The rescue was an old bakery. A location for their new studio and where they could start to create from scratch again.

 

– We stopped to like making music, and that was stressful. But having that location meant that we could go back without any pressure and start liking making music again, says Jonny Buckland.

 

On a new course with a world-wide hit

Out of the crisis came the world-wide hitsong ”Viva la vida” which reached the top of the charts. The hitsong also implied a quite new course for Coldplay. According to Coldplay they are now in their best phase ever.

 

– Just now we are in a phase that we are grateful to be in. We appreciate each other, and we really appreciate our audience. We are not concerned with taking over the world. We are here as a service for those wanting to listen, says Chris Martin.

 

So now it can only be worse / go downhill?

 

– Or be even better. You must choose to be happy. We are focusing on the good things and allowing the difficult things to pass. We are popular, but also unpopular; there are many people who do not like our music. We choose to focus on entertaining those who like us, says Chris Martin.

 

Critical when it comes to ”brexit”

Coldplay describe themselves as a democracy. Politics is important to the band members, especially in times like these – when Great Britain voted in favour of leaving the EU.

 

– Our politics as a band is very inclusive. We believe in being united, in love, goodness and in taking care of each other. What happens just now, in particular in Great Britain is not really what we represent. We are facing difficult times, but we have a hope that it will be good some time in the future, says Chris Martin.

 

The band members who say that they enjoy being on tour more than ever are playing tonight in Sweden.

 

– It is a privilege to visit Sweden. Especially now. It feels nice to be wellcome in a country within the European Union, says Chris Martin.

---------------

 

Coldplay about:

Paying tribute to Viola Beach at the Glastonbury festival:

 

– We had no connection/relation to them. We read about what had happened and recognized us in them. We were so similar to them when we were in the beginning of our carrier – when we had got our first record deal and when we were on our first tour. It felt so like what they went through. We wanted to pay tribute to them in some way in order to show our respect, says Chris Martin.

 

In the audience were Viola Beach’s families when Coldplay performed the pop band’s song ”Boys that sing”.

 

 

The cooperation and the future with star DJ Avicii:

 

– I came up with the idea to work with him and asked the rest of the band. We have another song that we might complete some day. I love him and loved working with him. The oddest cooperation is often the best, says Chris Martin.

 

Avicii and Coldplay have made the song ”A sky full of stars” together.

 

-------------------------------------------

Coldplay's performance at Friends in Stockholm, Sweden on 3 July 2016 (4 stars)

 

So longed for!

 

British Coldplay attracted 55,000 fans to Friends arena in Solna Sunday evening.

 

http://www.aftonbladet.se/nojesbladet/kronikorer/hakansteen/article23110708.ab

 

Translation / Editing from Swedish to English by Nancy Boysen

 

Coldplay’s performance at Friends in Stockholm, Sweden on 3.7.16

 

So good was the band's gig at Friends Arena

color:

I have heard Coldplay better.

But when they frame their music with this exuberant bursts of color, light, hope and faith, they manage to build a small world that it actually feels a bit hard to leave.

For it's so gray out there.

 

Many dislike Coldplay. A lot cannot stand their aura of "apostles of goodness ", incidentally, a title they have inherited from U2. From which, moreover, they have inherited a lot of other things too.

I can definitely understand that. When you want to be a positive force in the pop world, it is easy to be seen as hypocritical; the slightest misstep can be used against you.

But in the time we are living in now, I would rather accept a goodness apostle than a bitter cynic who thinks it's more important to be as rock and roll-like as possible.

Even as a live band, Coldplay has had the ability to switch between the dazzling and quite boring. I have seen the London-based band create magic at Stockholm Stadium and they almost made me fall asleep in Slottsskogen in Gothenburg.

 

Tonight, musically they do not really reach the stadium level - here are a few moments without proper glow and a few strange song choices (see the tracklist below), but they compensate with a visual delicacy that in a smart, neat and dramaturgical way transforms the hardly wasteful charming Friends arena into a multi-colored dream world of light and sound.

The grip to distribute color-flashing bracelets to everyone in the audience is amazingly effective and creates automatically a sense of belonging (now I can really hear how rock'n'roll police chuckles dismissively). And after a weekend with the wrong kind of headlines from (a festival in) Bråvalla and a lot more misery (Chris Martin invites us to send love to Turkey and Baghdad), it is healing and beneficial to hear Coldplay sing about star heavens and eternal glow.

Rihanna never appears on stage for her and Martin's duet "Princess of China", even though the song does not show up where it usually comes in the set, and despite rumors of her being present, but for long moments it is yet both overwhelmingly powerful and disarmingly intimate.

We have heard 'The Scientist' and 'Fix You' before, but Coldplay know what these songs mean to the fans and deliver them genuinely and carefully.

I like that the band really do not scrimp. They are anxious that no one should go home disappointed. It was a long time since I saw so generous amounts of show delivered by a really pretty unglamorous rock band.

But I also like when the band recall that 17 years ago they were the band that played at Kägelbanan in Stockholm in front of a few hundred people and make the stripped down versions of some early numbers/songs on a mini stage in the other end of the arena.

And I like Chris Martin's humility that does not seem the least fake. He seems genuinely grateful that he is still allowed to do this job - at this level. And I might vaguely feel that this is a rather hard job as well, that Coldplay - as the future hope of arena rock that they still are - feel pressure to deliver hits and be " modern" .

But Martin and his band have so far been balanced well in the difficult border between width and cred, and tonight they do it brilliantly.

And the cred ministry (??) may grin even a little more, but I really like that we have a band like Coldplay in this present time.

 

Håkan Steen

 

FACTS

Coldplay

Location:Friends arena, Solna.

Audience: Sold-out, 55,000.

Duration:115 minutes.

Best songs:”The scientist” and ”Fix you”.

Worst song:”’Heroes’”. Bowie himself would hardly be impressed.

 

Evaluation song by song

A head full of dreams (4 stars)

Charlie Chaplin speaks; wristbands distributed to all concert-goers are red-glowing;

Chris Martin rushes out on the ledge to the little stage out there in the audience; fireworks and confetti . Records in amount of arena rock per minute ?

 

Yellow (3 stars)

The wristbands change colour to yellow-green, and Coldplay performs (mangles) their first

megahit. Stable.

 

Every teardrop is a waterfall (3 stars)

Multi-coloured wristbands and sing-along, “bombs” and more confetti. No overly remarkable song, but huge show.

 

The scientist (4 stars)

Chris Martin at his rainbow-coloured piano in one of Coldplay’s very finest ballads. The entire audience singing ”Nobody said it was easy”.

 

Birds (3 stars)

Pigeons flying over the screens in one of Coldplay’s more guitar-driven numbers/songs off the latest album. Hardly their sharpest, however.

 

Paradise (4 stars)

Martin back at his piano. Heavy, almost parodic coldplayish ballad with football shoes. In the finale / at the end it explodes into Tiësto’s intensive dance remix. Lightning... raverock!

 

Always in my head (2 stars)

The band members sneak out to the small stage out in the audience, and the temperament is reduced significantly. By Coldplay standards right little show also.

 

Magic (3 stars)

The entire audience: ”hmm... what does it mean that they are suddenly playing lukewarm ”Magic” here, when their Rihanna duet ”Princess of China” usually turns up when we know that Rihanna is in town?”

 

Everglow (4 stars)

Martin, alone with the piano at the little stage, encourages us to send love to Turkey and Baghdad and later sings the big ballad off the latest album, with a little Muhammed Ali tribute on the screens.

 

Clocks (4 stars)

Back on the big stage, full Coldplay power. One of the band’s real cornerstones is just building up and up, and it gets as intensive as powerful.

 

Charlie Brown (3 stars)

A laser symphony and the introductory phrases from "Midnight" lead to another arena bomb. Without the same liberating climax as in " clocks ", though.

 

Hymn for the weekend (3 stars)

Coldplay vill låta moderna försökt maxa samtidskänslan och hitpotentialen med norska producenterna?? Coldplay want to sound modern and tried to mix (max out?) contemporary feel and the hit potential with Norwegian producers. Perhaps in particular in this song featuring Beyoncé. But not the most natural sound for Coldplay.

 

Fix you (4 stars)

Chris Martin, with a Swedish flag in the back pocket, is kneeling at the small stage singing his big wedding song together with the audience, then runs back letting the song explode. Impressive.

 

”Heroes” (2 stars)

Very few people succeed in doing good David Bowie covers. This version is okay, and Chris Martin makes it also remarkably indifferent.

 

Viva la vida (4 stars)

Much more fervor in this stadium killer. Yet another color explosion. Pure children's party, I ended up writing.

 

Adventure of a lifetime (3 stars)

... If it had not fitted even better here, where coloured balloons are filling large parts of the inner part of the stadium. Disco Coldplay with the best-looking guitar of the evening.

 

Extras:

 

In my place (4 stars)

After a snippet of " Amazing Grace " in the dark, Coldplay appear on a third stage, even further out into the audience, for a liberating, intimate rehearsal version of this early pearl.

 

Don’t panic (3 stars)

More rehearsal feeling. First song off the first album ”Parachutes” requested by a girl via Instagram.

 

God put a smile upon my face (3 stars)

Chris Martin tells us how he wrote this song in Stockholm after Coldplay’s first gig here, in ”some tiny bar” (Kägelbanan it was). He was looking for "a wintry feeling", but tonight it is rather heat.

 

Amazing day (4 stars)

The band members return to the big stage and deliver a rather undistinguished ballad which mostly works as breathing...

 

A sky full of stars (4 stars)

... too late the sky opens for more ”everything is possible, the world is beautiful” euphoria in technicolor and confetti with U2 dampers quite open.

 

Up & up (4 stars)

Psychedelic films with flying fish and cars driving on Saturn rings framing this easy - easy! – soul-colored power ballad that will leave us with hope : " we're gonna get it together somehow " sings Martin at the piano. Stylish final.

 

http://www.aftonbladet.se/nojesbladet/kronikorer/hakansteen/article23110708.ab

 

Translation / Editing from Swedish to English by Nancy Boysen (with assistance from Google Translate) - end of story - it is now 3:50 Central European Time, lol - I guess that I got carried away.

[I ran away]

I need Turkey and Bagdat talking. Video?

Did Chris say something about the horrible attack in Baghdad with more than 120 dead ? :cry: Cause these days he nearly always comments on attacks or dedicates a song.

 

EDIT: Just saw on Twitter that he did ! Great man, most people here only acknowledge attacks when they happen in Europe or North America, but for him all human beings on earth count. Respect.

[Krizer]

The show is over and I just arrived to my hotel. Maybe pics and reviews later, but all I can say now; I'm so so tired, but it was all worth it. One of the best days in my life :dance:

 

Loved that acoustic Everglow btw, I'm so happy they played that version :D

 

The setlist was:

1. AHFOD

2. Yellow

3. ETIAW

4. The Scientist

5. Birds

6. Paradise (+remix)

B-stage:

7. AIMH

8. Magic

9. Everglow (acoustic, Chris only)

A-stage:

10. Clocks (AOO excerpt)

11. Midnight (oh, I didn't know the vocals were playback)

12. Charlie Brown

13. HFTW

14. Fix You

15. Heroes

16. VLV

17. AOAL

C-stage

Kaleidoscope

18. In My Place (loved to hear this one though, as it is one of my fav songs)

19. Don't Panic (ig request)

20. GPASUYF

A-stage

21. Amazing Day

22. ASFOS

23. Up&Up

[cheeetaz]

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[cheeetaz]

Midnight

 

[MEDIA=instagram]BHauqFmD42i[/MEDIA]

Mobile Link: https://instagram.com/p/BHauqFmD42i/

 

 

 

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[JM-42]

oh what I would give to hear GPASUYF just once in my life

[Stephie]

I'm old. Instead of starting to queue in the morning like fellow hardcore fans, I sat in the courtyard of the Royal Palace and ate a cinnamon roll. Yes, indeed.

 

I was in Golden Circle and unfortunately, the crowd around me was a bit lame. For a moment I worried that Swedish people might not have arms to throw in the air. Many just seemed bored out of their minds, not moving one tiny body part. I had to party hard during the Paradise remix all by myself and got some funny looks. :D Wasn't really able to see what was going on on the ranks, but overall I was not that impressed with the atmosphere. The full Xylobands effec was awesome, though.

 

Loved all the little things that went wrong today: Chris' shirt not being on stage when he wanted to change (resulting in a funny bare-chested run across the stage), Jonny messing up the only four lines he has in 'Don't Panic' and Chris laughing so hard he spared him the further embarrassment of pausing, Chris & Jonny playfully arguing about who was responsible for 'Heroes' going a bit wrong in the beginning ("My bad." - "No, my bad." Very British.)...

 

Loved hearing 'God Put A Smile Upon Your Face' making a return. The smile on Chris' face when he has fun with the loop machine. :D Everglow solo was also such a pleasure. This way I could really feel him pouring everything into it. It's not a particular favourite if mine, but I realize that it means a lot to him. <3

[Batman]

I'm old. Instead of starting to queue in the morning like fellow hardcore fans, I sat in the courtyard of the Royal Palace and ate a cinnamon roll. Yes, indeed.

 

I was in Golden Circle and unfortunately, the crowd around me was a bit lame. For a moment I worried that Swedish people might not have arms to throw in the air. Many just seemed bored out of their minds, not moving one tiny body part. I had to party hard during the Paradise remix all by myself and got some funny looks. :D Wasn't really able to see what was going on on the ranks, but overall I was not that impressed with the atmosphere. The full Xylobands effec was awesome, though.

 

Loved all the little things that went wrong today: Chris' shirt not being on stage when he wanted to change (resulting in a funny bare-chested run across the stage), Jonny messing up the only four lines he has in 'Don't Panic' and Chris laughing so hard he spared him the further embarrassment of pausing, Chris & Jonny playfully arguing about who was responsible for 'Heroes' going a bit wrong in the beginning ("My bad." - "No, my bad." Very British.)...

 

Loved hearing 'God Put A Smile Upon Your Face' making a return. The smile on Chris' face when he has fun with the loop machine. :D Everglow solo was also such a pleasure. This way I could really feel him pouring everything into it. It's not a particular favourite if mine, but I realize that it means a lot to him. <3

I need to see a video of their banter *__*