We are now on to part nine (we'll reach double figures if it kills us!) of the Wembley fan reviews, continuing with more stories from Coldplay's concert on Saturday 19th September. Some great reviews of the two Wembley shows have so far been published at the Coldplay Live forum with still more being added. Thanks to all the Coldplayers who have contributed with tweets, pictures, videos, reviews and of course masses of discussion so far. Please add your reviews to this thread (now a whopping 390 pages!) if you have something to say about the show. So, here is the promised ninth edition:
Saturday was the better of the two nights IMO. The crowd was up for it! Rain, who cares. Bring it on because everyone was there to party. After breakfast we all stashed our junk in Chris' room at the hotel and went to queue. Can I just say how frickin awesome Chris was this whole weekend. He was running about and doing stuff for us all the time. Such a sweetie. Mich had to get to tickets, so we all split up agian til we could find out our gate. I was worried because our gate ended up being about as far from Jonny as we could get, but the crew running our gate was top notch and we got in really fast, ran....sorry we walked fast ....to the front row in front of Jonny. Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. White Lies played a nice set again. He's still pretty...
Girls Aloud..........why me. I developed special ear muffs made from 2 water glasses, but still it could not be blocked out. Jay Z was kick ass! Had the whole place bouncing. Chris is practally part of his possy and got shout outs both nights. Our side had to be "Jigga whos" and everyone knows the jigga whos always suck. Then comes the Coldplay and the rain. I had brought a poncho, so no worries but when Jonny ran out in it with his guitar I was afraid he would get electrocuted! It didn't last too long and cooled down the crowd, so it was kind nice. So many great moments. The multiple chants of "Jonny" we got going. The echo of the crowd singing Trouble. I really hope this comes out as a DVD. Security was much better on second night and we got water when we asked. [thanks TheAngie]
Picture by iriden
...I thought the stadium was so beautiful! As a football fan I really hope to see a game there one day! I loved the arch, tho I didn't see it lit up during the concert, only after it..And I'm only now really starting to realize how fucking huge it was! Aaand hmm..Well it was just beautiful I don't know about how good it is for concerts, because I we were so close so it didn't really matter, it was fine for me (too loud almost I still get that fuzzy sound in my ears when I go to sleep..not a good sign). Anyways, I thought it was brilliant! [thanks johkujii]
Perfect way to refer to Coldplays Viva la Vida tour. I didnt drink and it was a blur of color and sound that is definable by moments, but mostly a beautiful blur. I LOVED your review and wish I'd been you that night!! Their shine will NEVER wear off! [thanks LadyMadia]
A homecoming is often associated with celebration. It is usually special, fulfilling and oozes with optimism. A homecoming finale however, is the icing on the cake and needs something grandiose to completely transform it into a Christmas-esque event. For Coldplay punters, this is their first 'Christmas' of the year and who can argue with that when you got the buzzing White Lies, the -well, fun I suppose, Girls Aloud and the simply storming Jay Z to warm up and open before Coldplay. 9PM and clad in their Adam Ant-esque costumes (lets face it, they raided his wardrobe), Chris Martin and co. take to the stage, accompanied by sparkles and cheers as they open with their instrumental Life In Technicolor from their globally successful Viva La Vida......album. The crunch and march of Violet Hill; guitarist Johnny Buckland's twinkling notes on In My Place; and the hypnotic Clocks are all rattled off in quick succession, demonstrating that both the band and audience are in sync.
Chris Martin is one of the last people you would name as a rock star. Instead of demanding attention from the masses, he pleads for attention as he emotionally runs through X&Y's The Hardest Part. His now ever present catchphrase "everybody doing OK?" sends shock-waves of smiles across Wembley, to a point where he comically stumbles on a piano note. And from there, the show really begins. They summon the strikingly familiar string section of number #1 hit Viva La Vida, which causes a nearly natural reaction from the crowd - everyone ascended to their feet like they've recieved a message from the heavens as Buckland coordinated the 'whoooahs.' It was powerful, spine-tingling and down right intimate.
Speaking of intimacy, they somehow managed to dodge the crowd and run into a small platform located 3/4 of the way of the pitch for their encore. Compared with the Wembley's past performers such as Muse's futuristic Black Holes and Revelations Tour, Take That's The Circus Tour and recently U2 360 Tour, Coldplay's stage set-up lacks that extravaganza. Yet, their charisma and playfulness with their masses regularly made up for it. The showering of beautiful confetti butterflies during indie sparkler Lovers In Japan is one of many examples of the relationship with their audience (unfortunately, my nosebleed seats prevented me from catching some. Or I could have jumped...). What next for Coldplay? 4 albums in and they are already one of the biggest acts on the planet. Final show of the tour and their spirits are up. Too bad I didn't catch their final applause due to me scurrying out of the stadium like a frightened rabbit to avoid being shackled to Wembley along with 70,000+ people trying to get home at the same time. [via: achtungnielsen4.blogspot.com]
Coldplay, Jay zzzzzz and Girls 'should not be' Aloud... After the triumph that was U2 at Wembley stadium a few weeks ago, it was the turn of Coldplay to step up to the plate. We have seen them a couple of times before, so I figured there would be no problem. Before the main event we had to endure Girls Aloud who were delightfully awful. Mrs B had read a couple of reviews of their previous shows which were glowing. I can only assume that the reviewer was trying desperately hard to get into Cheryl's tiny white panties, because in truth they were dreadful (No not the white panties, I didn't actually get to see them so don't feel qualified to say). The ginger one makes me want to hurl every time I see her. What were they thinking when they added her to the group? If they were going for girl next door looks they fell wide of the mark, managing instead to corner the hideously disfigured scary woman from up the road market instead. On the plus side for her, it looks like she is breaking into the film industry. That was her I saw her playing the painting at the end in the recent Dorian Gray movie , wasn't it????. Now the same can't be said of Cheryl. While she may have the looks of an angel, her voice has more of the air of a Tyneside docker, and an out of tune one at that.
This left the choreographed dance routines. Surely they must have been good? You would have thought so, but the reality is that your great Aunt Ethel, the one with the double hip replacement and dodgy knees (not forgetting the flatulence when she eats sprouts) moves better than these girls. Sad but true and remember, Ethal has always been rather generous at Christmas and Birthdays, you can never have too many pairs of white flannel socks in your life plus flatulence is hardly noticeable, unless you happen to be in the first couple of rows..... Jay Zed (It's a long story) or should that be Jay Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz was up next and as I feared he did nothing for me, other than make me hungry (and I don't mean for more). One of his songs had an Indian rift running through it, which left me wanting a curry and with a strange desire to be in a room surrounded by red flock wallpaper. None of my concert companions - Mrs B, Kirsty or Vinnie - were affected in the same way so my curry crush went unsated....
So having survived the ordeal of "The support bands" what could go wrong.....? Hmmmm, 10 minutes before Coldplay were due on stage the heavens opened (Way to go weather men, with your 20% chance of rain. That's most impressive you normally claim 80% chance of rain and get it wrong). Now most people would regard this as a bad thing but not me as it actually resolved a dilemma for our little party:- Mrs B was not enjoying the crush at the front or not being able to see the stage... but... Kirsty had lost her glasses (this is the girl who managed to mistake a field of Llamas for a field of cows. Hey, on the positive side she did recognise it was a field) so anything further than a foot back from the stage was going to mean a big blurry ordeal for her. The rain decided for us and we scurried to the back of the stadium and undercover. That way none of us got to see anything other than some stick insects but at least we stayed dry. The rain also turned out to be a relief for Vinnie as well. It has already been established in a previous BlackLOG that he is not a big fan of being in the car with the roof down, so since one of my rules for topless driving is that it has to be dry (the other being it has to be above freezing, although this rule has often been broken on blue sky winter days. It's not that bad, after the first 10 minutes the numbing sensation takes over from the pain of early onset frost bite) he knew he was going to get a lift home with the roof up.....
As for Coldplay they put on a good show which was ruined by the acoustics echoing around the stadium. I think it might have been due to the roof - for U2 it was fully opened but I notice that for Coldplay it was partly closed and I believe it was this that caused the echo problem. I like Chris Martin and believe he is a genuinely nice guy, but how many times can you ask the audience if they are OK and having a good time? A couple of times is OK, but once you start reaching double figures it gets a little dull. Nice touch with the X-factor sing along competition, although possibly a bit cheesy with the Simon Fuller video interaction bit, but entertaining all the same. The only thing was how could they bring Jay ZZZZZZZ back on stage for a duet? After all I had only just started to get over his rather dreary support set. [via: the-blacklog.blogspot.com
Picture by iriden
Arriving in London
Arriving at Wembley (being quite sad and moody) with my luggages at 3pm on Friday and feeling already better after few seconds with Coldplayers.
- ''- Is that Ian ? - yes that's him - wowww''
- Going to gate H&J with Chavi to film Coldplayers running... oops sorry, I mean, walking quickly
- Stealing some announcement papers concerning the fact the show was filmed
- Going to the hotel with C&C to rest a bit, dancing on Madonna, (throwing up after dancing on Madonna), rolling on the floor, being crazy, coughing together, singing Britney Spears...etc and getting ready to leave to the stadium for an all nighter
Friday evening and night outside the stadium
- the atmosphere when the 3 of us started to queue before the beginning of the first gig
- seeing all those couple arguing before the gig and helping a guy to find his crying wife
- dancing, singing and enjoying the gig from outside the stadium during the first songs
- Policemen making sure ''everything's alright'' : they actually thought we were there only to enjoy a free concert but they ended up making sure we were ready enough for the night, lovely !
- First roadie coming to give each of us a LRLRL
- In my place : we started doing what the guys were doing inside the stadium, Carla was Guy, Chavi was Chris and I played Jonny. Some roadies passed by and I explained I was Jonny, then Chavi ran to jump on my shoulders ahaha... awesomeness !
- Second roadie (Dave) coming to give the 3 of us a second LRLRL
- A guy we helped (showing him where the box office was) coming back to give one of us a FREE ticket for the Friday gig... Brotherhood ? None of us decided go on her own and we just kept the unused ticket
- Hearing the crowd singing Yellow and Fix You
- Woman working at the Wembley box office asking us if we were joking when saying we were queuing for the next gig and then making sure we were at the right gate
- Asking people who were leaving early to give us their tickets (which some of them did !) as souvenirs
- Starting to help Dave giving away some LRLRL just for fun after VLV
- Getting serious and now working for Coldplay for real , having fun trying to give away more CDs than the Wembley crew, enjoying this awesome experience
- Meeting some Coldplayers after the first show
- Being offered a sandwich and some tea around midnight by a Wembley security guy
- Being offered some tea again during the night by Dave
(Can you believe how everyone was SO lovely ?)
- Trying to turn off the street lights by putting some LRLRL cartons in front of them (I know I sometimes have awesome ideas ahaha)
- Coughing the whole night without sleeping
- Being saved by Noelia and Denise at morning, which enabled us to go to the hotel to take a shower and (try to) sleep a bit
Saturday's queue
- Fighting ourselves to go back in the queue at 9am (was hard to leave the comfy hotel)
- Queuing at the box office, discovering we actually spent a whole night outside at the wrong gate, crying stupidly, being saved by Min who so kindly exchanged her tix with ours (btw Mark, thank you for running everywhere for us)
- Going back to the M&N queue, discovering lotsa Coldplayers joined us, trying to rest a bit although the weather was now way too hot for me
- Chavi and Cooky coming back from the hotel with my red rose for Miller <3
Inside Wembley
- Being ultra quick when running down the Wembley stairs (however, as I never pay attention to the direction I'm running in, I ran to the left side whereas we said we would go to the right, I thus had to leave the barrier I reached to join Chavi, Denise and Carla which made me ending up second row with Cooky and Mark)
- Laughing at the crazy GA fan whose body was shaking of excitement before the WL
- Seeing my future husband (R#42) climbing up the stage structure to set up a camera (sad I had no voice to catch his attention though, but Cooky helped me a lot)
- Jumping and enjoying the WL with Cooky, clapping hands together (one of my hand was busy holding my Miller red rose so I was clapping her left hand with my right hand ahah)
- Laughing at the GA (we're so mean girls)
- Anna enjoying GA (shhhhush, don't deny it, I've got a the proof on video)
- Cooky killing my red rose (and me threatening her not to help her obtaining a Will drumstick XD)
- Matt (projectionist, most friendly roadie ever) seeing my ban and letting me know he'll come back to take a pic of it
- not being able to enjoy Jay-Z that much because of my cough
- ROADIE TIME (now people should know that's one of the my fav moments ahah), Miller climbing up again (but I don't think he saw my banner), Min pretending Miller wasn't here (''- come on I saw him climbing up there - that's not him - liar'')
- Matt coming back to take a picture, Brook chatting with us at the same time (promising he'll give my R#42 banner to the man and putting the rose ''IN'' my tee-shirt saying ''he already has a girlfriend'' BUHUHUHU ), Matt coming down to sign the ban I made for him and to give Denise a guitar pick before realising he didn't have any for me
- Thanking Matt for everything when he left us
- Matt looking for me few minutes before the beginning of the gig, asking for more pictures ''cause my friends are NEVER going to believe me'', signing the ban with a better marker (had to throw the ban away at the end of the gig - because of the rain - but I kept the piece he signed ) and giving me 3 guitar picks ! He's so f*cking lovely, I tell ya !
- Miller setting other cameras on the left side of the stage
- Suddenly raining like cats and dogs on Jay-Z's Give it 2 me
- Going crazy under the rain
- Throwing accidentally my camera toward the stage at the begining of LiT
- The guys being all smiley and happy
- Enjoying the show for the last time
- The return of Chris Bra-tin
(- Chris taking off his shirt again)... I didn't write that
- Obtaining Will's drumstick for Cooky (yes, that was a collective work ahah)
- Last eye contacts with Chris
- A roadie (I'm pretty sure it was Dave) throwing butterflies over our heads after Lovers
- Chris saying ''Thank You'' to Anna after reading her ban !
- Last minutes... LiTii, jumping with Carla's hand in mine (sorry I kept on jumping ahah)
- The nice security guy who spent 5 min looking for my flag and signed banner under the thick carpet of butterflies at the end of the gig
- ''Another lovely roadie'' (hehe...) coming to me to gimme a setlist whereas I didn't ask for anything, this man rocks as well !
After the gig
- MEETING COLDPLAYERS, final picture, giving the big boss a guitar pick and some LRLRL
- Crazy McDonald time at 1am (apologies for being ultra tired guys, you know I hadn't slept for quite a long time)
- Meeting Coldplayers
- Meeting Coldplayers
- Meeting Coldplayers
[thanks khalplay]
More photos of Coldplay at Wembley stadium, London, UK (19th September 2009):
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