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Legal action against illegal file-sharers has helped to bring an 8 per cent rise in global digital-music revenues, but an industry report claims stars should stop boycotting streaming services such as Spotify, writes The Independent today.   A rise in the take-up of legal music-subscription services helped digital revenues to hit $5.2bn (£3.3bn) in 2011, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry said. One in four internet users still accesses unauthorised services on a monthly ba

Coldplay‘s manager Dave Holmes has confirmed the band’s latest album Mylo Xyloto will eventually appear on the popular music streaming site Spotify, but insists he remains ‘very concerned’ about the latest medium to offer a free listening service online. He told Business Week, "I am very concerned that Spotify competes with download stores. Like all of Coldplay’s other titles, the new album will be on Spotify eventually." (More discussion on the Spotify/streaming topic in the Coldplay forum now

Despite serpentine queues, heavy traffic and a long wait for those who had chosen to arrive at the venue early, the launch event of Abu Dhabi hosting the 2011-2012 Volvo Ocean Race — and the capital's main New Year's Eve party — was a resounding success, writes Glf News in another review of last weekend's Coldplay's New Year's Eve concert in Abu Dhabi. [Full discussion on this show is at the Coldplay Live forum and more reviews can be found at WikiColdplay now (thanks to all who have contributed

Coldplay's rain-soaked 2009 performance at Emirates Palace has become part of modern UAE folklore, with drenched Chris Martin crooning Singing in the Rain remaining a lasting image, writes The National in a review of Coldplay's New Year's Eve concert in Abu Dhabi at the weekend. [Full discussion on Coldplay's New Year's Eve concert in Abu Dhabi is at the Coldplay Live forum now (thanks to all who have contributed to the thread so far!)]   This time, however, the group returned to the capital to

Like a game of sheikh poker, The Mirror have matched The Sun's Coldplay Abu Dhabi payday estimate of £1m and raised them another £1m as the latest figure banded about for Coldplay to play twelve songs at the New Year's gig in UAE is now £2million. (Think that's a lot? It's only about half of what Jay-Z and Kanye West got for performing at a birthday party for Sheikh Mansour in Dubai recently!)   The Mirror continued: Gwyneth Paltrow would be forgiven for giving Chris Martin the Cold shoulder aft

Coldplay won't be in front of the TV watching Jools Holland on New Years' Eve, they'll be pocketing £1million for their slot at the Volvo Ocean Race venue in Abu Dhabi, writes The Sun this morning. Read on for their story... [Full discussion on Coldplay's New Year's Eve concert in Abu Dhabi is at the Coldplay Live forum now (thanks Skuze23, Mimixxx & _Tash)]   The Sun continued: They were persuaded to play there by the Emirate's Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Zayed. Platinum table tickets for th

Offering some festive cheer in the way of a Coldplay article (and almost previewing their forthcoming show on April 18th) are the Calgary Herald, who write this entitled 'Reasons to like Coldplay'. After you've got past the U2 comparisons and the Gwyneth references that invades most Coldplay articles these days, we couldn't think of a better way to say merry Christmas than this. So enjoy the article and... merry Christmas!   In 2008, Coldplay frontman Chris Martin famously told the U.K. newspape

It’s easy enough to diss Coldplay: they make music that’s hugely successful (boo!) and not terribly challenging; they’re middle class – a heinous crime in a form of entertainment that’s steeped in notions of “authenticity” (hence the enduring love affair between music critics and the oafish Oasis – hey, they take lots of drugs and they used to steal car radios!); and as people they just seem a bit nice, to the point of dullness, writes The Arts Desk today, in a 4/5 star review of Coldplay's sho

Our next Mylo Xyloto on this Friday comes from The Harbinger - part of the My High School Journalism website. The Harbinger is based at Miami Lakes Educational Center, Miami Lakes, FL. They note that even when Coldplay have clearly changed their sound, there are still old-school Coldplay in MX with songs such as Charlie Brown and UFO. But has their risky change of direction paid off? Find out below...   Ever since the release of Parachutes in 2000, Coldplay and its front man, Chris Martin, have

They might be one of the world's biggest bands but, for four years, Coldplay have been keeping a secret. The band have been the biggest secret benefactors of Kids Company, the children's charity working with vulnerable young people in some of the most deprived areas of London, writes The Guardian in a great article previewing the Under 1 Roof concert taking place on 10th December. Read on for the rest of the article... [More discussion on this article is at the Coldplay forum now (thanks _Tash)]

It seems that Q Magazine's latest article on Coldplay is a hot topic at the moment, just look at all the sub-headlines that are sprouting up all over the internet because of its publication. Instead of reading those, we've transcribed the full interview for you, so read it in it's entirity and make up your own headlines. Enjoy...!   The neutral observer of any big awards ceremony will notice that how late an artist arrives is directly proportional to their fame. On the Monday afternoon of the Q

Our next Mylo Xyloto review is one we've been waiting for for some time. It comes from Q Magazine (print-only), who have given the new album a perfect 5/5 stars, announcing that Britain's biggest band sound more alive than ever, and the fifth album will sustain Coldplay's imperial position for a long time to come. Read on for their top-notch review and scans...   On July 8th, 2011, the final historic flight of Nasa's space shuttle program scorched a hole through the clouds on its way to the Inte

In continuation of our features involving less mainstream reviews of Coldplay's new album Mylo Xyloto, our next one comes from PJ Media, a lifestyle blog from Los Angeles. With much more detailed review than we would expect of a new album over a month after its release, PJ Media not only casts their eye over the new songs, the review features why Coldplay will continue to craft addictive 'pop confections' long after their critics have put down their pens. Read on for their review...   Expectatio

In continuation of our features involving less mainstream reviews of Coldplay's new album Mylo Xyloto, our next one comes from The Maneater, the official student newspaper of the University of Missouri. A short but succinct review that captures the feeling that tweaks to Coldplay's sound is more than good enough at this stage of their career. Oh and they love the collaboration with Rihanna too. They give the album overall a solid 3/5 stars. Read on for their review...   For some, Coldplay’s cont

A new interview with Chris Martin has surfaced online - the source being Men's magazine Maxim. In it, Chris discusses (again) the Rihanna collaboration, and other topics such as his 'buff new physique', fighting with desks, waking up in a school playground in South Chicago, and the Bruce Springsteen influence. Incidentally, the interviewer, Joe Levy, is the same interviewer who was asking the questions for the Charlie Rose programme aired in 2006. Read on... [Discuss this article in the Coldplay

Our latest featured review of Mylo Xyloto is from the Same Same website (Australian lifestyle magazine), who are another media outlet who enjoyed Mylo Xyloto. In fact, generally speaking although we try hard to reflect the general populous by posting a mix of good and bad reviews 'out there', we haven't actually found that many bad ones recently. Even the latest blog reviews we found over the last 48 hours have been highly positive, with only a couple posting mid-range scores. Read on for Same S

Our latest featured review of Mylo Xyloto is from the San Francisco Weekly blogs site, who on their first listen of the new album have compared Coldplay with 1970's rock band, The Police, the 'never-cool band that nevertheless forced cool people to notice it in addition to the rest of the world'. PJ Harvey, M83, Robyn and the Pet Shop Boys all get a mention too. How do they arrive at these comparisons? Read on for their full review...   The No. 1 album in the country this week is by the biggest

Coldplay’s decision to hold their new album, Mylo Xyloto, from all streaming services was one that record label EMI was reportedly uncomfortable with; but first week sales suggested it was a winning strategy that now hangs a question mark over the place of streaming for blockbuster releases, writes The Music Network in just one of dozens of articles on the subject (just take a look at how much interest there is in the Spotify story). Read on for the rest of this particular article... [Read some

Coldplay's fifth album - Mylo Xyloto - is now over a week old (officially anyway) and as well as the media reviews we've been posting we promised another batch of Coldplayer 'first impression' reviews, along with the latest poll results from the main site and the forums. So far we've had in total somewhere in the region of 2500 votes asking what you thought of Mylo Xyloto - on a sliding scale from 10 (Brilliant) to 0 (Crap). Read on for some more of those reviews and also the latest polling figu

Or as one publisher remarked this week, "getting played is nice, getting paid is better."   This is exactly the opposite result that Spotify wanted, reports the Digital Music News website. Because after skipping Spotify entirely on their latest release, Mylo Xyloto, Coldplay has scored a one-week, digital album sales record in the UK, as we reported a couple of days ago. That is, digital sales north of 83,000, part of an impressive, chart-topping tally of 208,343 units in the UK alone.  

We're into double figures now with our featured Mylo Xyloto reviews and how fitting it is to give way on our tenth review to Pitchfork - the score many people were waiting for. Their rating of 7/10 surprised many, given that no other Coldplay album has received a higher score from them. You can read earlier articles on the score previews and also the final poll results on what you thought the score might be. Well, now we know what they've given, you can read exactly what Pitchfolk thought to bac

The next of our featured Mylo Xyloto album review comes from the website Dale & Co - a great current affairs 'mega-blog' from the UK. Their Mylo Xyloto review rates the album an 8.5/10, and focuses on Coldplay's continuing desire to 'take the world by storm' whilst exploring different musical approaches with the fifth album. Here reads their review...   Bono once said during the promotion for All That You Can’t Leave Behind at the turn of the century that U2 were “reapplying for the job of t

The next of our featured Mylo Xyloto album review comes from the Sabotage Times from London who write quirky articles. Their Mylo Xyloto review is no different - although they don't give a rating for the album, they bloody love it, with their standout track being Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall. Read on for their review...   Once upon a time I hated Coldplay, but their latest album 'Mylo Xyloto' contains a brand of non-X-Factor pop that I can't help but love. I used to think Chris Martin was a sof

Coldplay's fifth album - Mylo Xyloto - has been released worldwide today (including the US now we've heard!) some three and a bit years after Viva La Vida, to another huge wave of media and Coldplayer reviews. Read on for some more of your first impressions of the new album - including the latest poll results on what you thought of it. So far 44% of visitors to the main site and 30% of people on the messageboard gave the album full marks - but there are votes right across the board. Read on for

They've invented a new word for the title of their latest album, Chris Martin says he's "nasty", and they played with Christy Moore as a tribute to their drummer's mum. Coldplay are easing into superstardom in style writes RTE Ten (Ireland) in an online article after they caught up with the band at the Bakery/Beehive studios. (Full discussion on this new article is at the Coldplay forum now.) [thanks Mimixxx]   The first time I see Chris Martin he is a breathless blur of vivid blues and red boun