The next of our featured Mylo Xyloto album review comes from the Globe and Mail from Canada who have published their review of the new album today. They have given the album a very good 3.5/5 and call Coldplay "the rising hope of album music," at a time when Coldplay themselves regularly throw doubt on the future of the LP format in interviews. Read on for their review...

We never saw this coming. Coldplay, the onetime Radiohead-lite with melancholic melodies that reached to heavens, cheap seats and singles charts, is now the rising hope of album music, if not other (more substantial) things. "Slow it down," Chris Martin croons, wiping our brow on the affecting acoustic ballad Us Against the World. "Through chaos as it swirls, it’s just us against the world."

Chaos swirling – yeah, everybody’s feeling it, from Middle East dictators and record companies on down. And now this hopeful transmission from one of the world’s biggest bands, whose means of uplift have never sounded more sincere than on Mylo Xyloto, an elegant conceptual album of soaring soft rock and pop leanings that plays down (but does not completely abandon) the self-conscious sonic revolution of Viva la Vida.

Mylo is one of the album’s protagonists, Xyloto being the other, with their love story set in an oppressive future. (This is standard rock-opera stuff; see the Queen-inspired We Will Rock You, The Who’s never-realized Lifehouse project and Styx’s Kilroy Was Here – domo arigato, Mr. Xyloto.)

Matching Mylo and Xyloto dolls may one day be sold in the lobby of a Broadway theatre, is what I mean to say. Produced by people including Markus Dravs (Arcade Fire, Mumford & Sons) and with “Enoxification” by Brian Eno (Bono’s ears, and the man behind the glass for Viva la Vida), Coldplay’s fifth album begins with a tinkling prelude before jumping into Hurts Like Heaven, a grandiose rush of Police upbeat, with a grimy solo from guitarist Jonny Buckland.

The shape-shifting Paradise swoops and soars with euphoric chants over modern beats, ending with a piano outro to release the tension. Guest singer Rihanna brings her catchy umbrella to Princess of China, a shimmering slice of big pop. Major Minus is funky like Perry Farrell.

There are instrumental interludes.

Every Teardrop is a Waterfall begins with the world’s biggest harpsichord, followed shortly by a hardy acoustic strum. “I turn the music up, I got my records on / from underneath the rubble, sing a rebel song,” halloos Martin. “Don’t want to see another generation drop / I’d rather be a comma than a full stop.”

The song never does leave the verge, though, even with the Sunday Bloody Sunday drum riff at the end – speaking of that rebel song. Coldplay, having studied U2, are keen to carry torches forward.

Up With the Birds, a classic ballad/lullaby, closes the affair lushly and optimistically. Martin softens us with lines about simple plots and good things coming our way – the stuff of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Oh, what a beautiful day? More so, now. 3.5/5.

October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! (Updated: 20th October) [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

It almost goes without saying that a new Coldplay album is a monumental event on the pop calendar, writes Digital Spy in an online article after they caught up with the drummer Will Champion a mere 24 hours before the LP's hand-in to find out more. Their last album, 2008's Viva la Vida, sold over nine million copies and topped the charts worldwide, defying declining music sales and securing their position as a global indie-pop force. (Full discussion on this new article is at the Coldplay forum now.)

What would you be doing now if you weren't talking to us?

"We've actually got 24 hours left to finish the record, so we're all in spellcheck mode at the moment! Can you imagine if there was some horrid glitch on the record that we hadn't picked up on?"

That would be pretty embarrassing. Is there a giant countdown clock on the wall?

"Not quite, but we're the sort to use every single second we're given to work on a record. We've had two years and we're still rushing at the last minute. 12 years down the line you'd think we'd know how to do it. The last 5% of an album takes such a long time."

It's been three years since Viva la Vida. How have you and the band been keeping?

"We're good thanks - we haven't really done much to be honest! We've been working pretty much solidly. We toured and then the next album quickly started to evolve. I think we only had a month off. We wanted it to feel like a fresh start as if we're starting as a new band. You need a fresh mindset to keep you motivated."

It seemed like for a while that there wouldn't be a new Coldplay album this year; what happened?

"We never know who's telling people what, but it generally takes us a long time to make records. We got to a point earlier this year where we knew we had to get on with it to do the festivals. That gave us a stick to measure ourselves by. Since then, one more song has emerged which is a really important part of the record; but there are also songs that are three years old."

Do you consider yourselves perfectionists? There's always that worry that you can over-think an album...

"We're perfectionists in the sense that we take it seriously and we want everything to be presented properly. We spend ages deciding on the gaps between the songs and how loud the notes are and how the songs relate to each other. The devil's in the detail."

What does Mylo Xyloto mean?

"We had an idea early on in making a record that there was a story behind it and the music would serve as the soundtrack. Originally we were looking into making an animated film, but that would have taken too long to make. Mylo Xyloto was the main character of the story, but it's also an umbrella term for the album. It's mysterious, enigmatic and forces people to use their imagination. There's still a story in the album if you really look into it."

It's also pretty unique...

"Exactly! We originally Googled the name and nothing came up. It's nice that the title is unique to us as a band."

Which are your favourites on the album?

"That's like asking which of your children is your favourite. They mean a lot to us, they frustrate us as well as inspire us. My favourite at the moment is 'Up In Flames', probably because it's the most recent song we recorded."

People are saying it's your most chart-friendly album to date, and some of the songs remind us of Viva la Vida's 'Lovers In Japan'; would you agree?

"I think I would actually, and weirdly enough that was the very last song we recorded for that album. If you made a timeline you could see a progression and continuation of that sound. We liked that the song had colour and was uplifting - we wanted to build on that for an entire record."

What makes the Coldplay sound so unique?

"Ultimately that comes from all four of us. Music is so available today and it's hard to be original, but bands like us and other great bands survive because of our chemistry. Every chord progression has already been written before, so the only unique thing you can have is who is involved."

All your albums have sold extraordinarily well given the current climate. Do you anticipate the same for this album?

"We've learnt now - especially given the climate - not to think about it too much. The sense of achievement we get comes from knowing we've tried to make the best record possible. I think that's the only real measure now. The days of selling tens of millions of copies has gone, so there's no point using that yard stick anymore. Of course, something inside us we'll still be keeping an eye on that."

Surely the label will be hoping for big numbers...

"Honestly, they don't put any pressure on us. We feel like we want to work as hard as we can while we still can. The pressure is self-inflicted to keep going - we're fully aware that there are millions of people who'd love to be in our position so we're going to make the best of it."

What would happen if one of your albums underperformed? Would it be the end of Coldplay?

"Not at all! We're very happy with what we've done for this record. I've got no idea when it's going to be over and we don't seen an end to the band. I'm making the most it while I still can and working as hard as possible."

You're already one of the favourites to win a Mercury Prize next year. Do you feel it's about time you got one?

"We gave up on that one a long time ago! Some time in 2000, I think. I don't think we're in that category anymore, but it's nice to be talked about. Put it this way, we won't be counting our chickens on that one! I don't know what the criteria is, but they always pick great albums anyway."

Do you prefer being in Coldplay in 2011 or 2002?

"2002 was quite a fun year actually. We did Glastonbury that year for the first time which was incredible. It dawned on us that we were really on to something. That said, I'm a very happy man these days too, so I think I'd have to say 2011."

Is it about time you got back to finishing the album?

"Yes, I probably should. I'm going to go across the road and decide on the gap of silence between tracks three and four."

How many seconds are you thinking?

"One and a half - I think it's going to be a snappy one!"

More photos of Coldplay at KROQ (19th October 2011):

Photos courtesy of KROQ Radio @ Flickr

Coldplay release their fifth album Mylo Xyloto worldwide on Monday (24 October), and with the record already earning a host of acclaim for its mix of anthemic songwriting, collaborations - including one with Rihanna on Princess Of China - and cutting edge production, Q Magazine spoke to some of those involved in making the album to get a unique, behind the scenes perspective on its creation. Producers Markus Dravs, Rik Simpson and Daniel Green; sleeve designers Tappin & Gofto and the band's drummer Will Champion give us their eye witness account of the making of Mylo Xyloto. (Full discussion on this new article is at the Coldplay forum now. [thanks mimixxx & Skuze23]

Will Champion: "We're prone to saying things before we write an album that prove to be totally wrong. There came a point last summer when we realised we had different types of songs in various styles, so rather than make an album that's all stripped-down we decided to throw everything into 
the one basket. It's true we scrapped stuff, but 
a lot of those songs became antecedents of what you'll hear on the finished album. It's all part of our musical evolutionary process."

Rik Simpson: "The plan was always to make a forward thinking record, something that had never been heard before. I think more than any other Coldplay album Mylo Xyloto embraces a contemporary sonic world but still retains the feeling of a band at the top of their game playing together in a room."

Markus Dravs: "The album began for me when I turned up really because I was just finishing Arcade Fire's The Suburbs over in Canada. That went on a bit longer than anticipated, although to be honest we always knew it would be a bit late [laughs], so I turned up but the band had spent a fair bit of time with Brian [Eno], Rik [simpson] and Dan [Green] - Dan is Coldplay's live engineer who helped out on the last record but more in a background role - so there wasn't really an official start to the record. They are always writing, whether in a soundcheck or a hotel. They're good, hard working musicians, they have an idea, they get together to write and as they've got their own studio there's less of a writing and recording schedule, Rik and Dan work for the band permanently and Brian comes along when his schedule permits or when they need him.

Rik Simpson: "We built our own studio in North London [The Bakery in Hampstead which was expanded to include rehearsal space The Beehive across the road for Mylo Xyloto] to give ourselves more breathing space to develop the bands music, consequently a lot of the songs grew out of a very organic process where the recordings really captured the essence of the songwriting as they developed together."

Will Champion: "[The Beehive] It's like an old village hall, a big space where we can play together. Often when you're making an album you can become alienated from one another in a studio environment. The Beehive was a deliberate move to get us playing together so we could get a feel of how the songs would sound as a live band as we were recording, instead of waiting until the record was done and then going out on the road. Thursday nights were our Beehive nights. We'd be in there playing, almost like a gig. It was, literally, a hive of activity. We were all worker bees."

Markus Dravs: "So when I finished Arcade Fire I slept for a week and then went down there and eased myself into the process. They had a lot of ideas, a lot of songs, some made it on the record, some didn't. We just went through the songs on one instrument with Chris [Martin] singing the lyrics or the melody because I wanted to keep the two words [songwriting and production] very much apart. I don't believe a song can purely rely on the production, the longevity of a song will really shine when you stripe it right down. The better the song in its raw form, the more flexible it is long term. You can almost push the boat out further in the production the better the song is. When you're sonically trying to push the boat out a bit, let's face it can go very wrong - the dangers are it can get dated or you could get tired of listening to it - but you'll remember a song more by its melody and its lyrics. It's difficult to whistle a 3D sound!"

Daniel Green: "The plan for Mylo Xyloto was to have an album that was full of colour and felt like a journey from start to finish. There were a few demos as starting points but it was when the band got together and started experimenting with the songs and sounds that it really came together. From the start of the project one of the main goals was to give each song it's own sound as if it comes from its own world. So the production and song writing were often created together."

Will Champion: "There are a handful of songs on the album about trying to express yourself in a bleak world. A lot of Chris' lyrics refer to people standing up for themselves, even though they're being oppressed."

Markus Dravs: "Because there are a few of us, Chris will sometimes work in one corner by himself, while Guy will be working with someone else on a soundscape, so it's no necessarily, step one, step two, step three. It's more Look what he's done, that's great! Obviously as the record gets more finished that changes, as everyone starts pulling on the same string a bit more, but the idea was to start a record and make a record without worrying about what Coldplay stands for, it really was an open good."

Daniel Green: "Chris and I always referenced Thriller as we loved the concise song structures and sparse but powerful instrumentation and production."

Markus Dravs: "Making the album isn't about the number of producers or how many people are in the band, it's about appreciating each others' ideas. The best idea goes forward, it's an organic process. Everyone explores their own ideas, so if you have eight people - including the band - contributing it's not done on a schedule: Producer #2 is on between 14:00 and 15:00 today. It's more, Oh you stayed late last night and did that? I'll work on that other song today. Or the band will have come up with another song in the meantime. If something is going great, why change it in that process. Having done the last record with this team, you understand each other a bit more and how to get the best out of them."

Daniel Green: "Many of the little interesting sounds and atmospheres were created from the band and Brian Eno experimenting with sounds and instruments then Chris and I would listen though and take the great little bits of magic then sequence and layer these over the songs to add an extra dimension to the songs sonically."

Will Champion: "For this album Brian was more of a collaborative writer than a producer. He was with us more in the early stages when the songs were being created, though his influence is everywhere. He's omnipresent, even when he's not in the building he leaves his aura around for inspiration. Brian is a great sewer of seeds whereas Markus is the farmer. He has amazing powers of concentration, way beyond ours."

Markus Dravs: "To me the album works, as Chris said, as a record and I'll be interested to hear what people make of it, because I think it makes a lot of sense. I still enjoy listening to it now and I've heard it... quite a few times! [laughs] The way the record flows and the where the energy goes is really nice. I don't think we've been self-indulgent in any of the songs. We've pushed it enough yet each of those songs can be played on a single instrument so I think they stand up. And I'm very happy with the vehicle turned out to be for the songs. Can I pick a favourite track? I love all my children!

Daniel Green: "Can I pick a favourite? Us Against The World. I think the vocal performance and lyrics capture a real mood and emotion. I love the way the atmosphere evolves throughout the song."

Rik Simpson: "I don't really have one favourite. I see the album as one body of work rather than separate songs. I do feel this record has a strength and potential for longevity that becomes more apparent the more you immerse yourself in it."

Tappin & Gofto: "The main source of inspiration for the artwork was effectively discovered
 through conversation with the band. They're very passionate about their 
artwork and always have an idea for the kind of thing they want. It's kind
 of down to us to help try and bring this into reality and work through ideas with them until a direction is agreed upon collectively. We worked with the band on and off for a period of approximately five months before we reached the final direction for the
 artwork. When we had agreed the final art direction it then became more about how
 we got the very best out of the idea and about the details of the design for the
 album cover and associated artwork parts like the booklet, the label, the typography, etc. It was great, because even at that stage the band really like
to be involved, you really have to work thoroughly though all your ideas."

Markus Dravs: "I knew Rihanna [on Princess Of China] had been talked about for a while. The process didn't really have anything to do with me. All I can say, the song suits her and in my opinion she was asked as a musician rather than a popstar. No one can deny how great her pipes her, so why not?"

Tappin & Gofto: "How much did the title influence the artwork? A pretty big factor this time, obviously the cover consists of a logo type that is effectively an abbreviated form of the title itself. But aside from that, subconsciously it influences the feel of the artwork, you always refer back to it in everything you do. We focus solely on the album front cover first and foremost, that has to be the drive for the artwork. It's what everything else relates to and what all
other material is developed out from. Ultimately if it's a strong, dynamic, 
interesting image, it should work on any level."

Will Champion: "Erm, it does look a bit Clash, doesn't it? [the graffiti look]. When I saw the press shots the first thing I noticed was how much Chris looked like Joe Strummer."

Markus Dravs: "So how long did it all take? I think it was a year on and off. There were long gaps like summer holidays and winter holidays. With a band like this they can't tour and play some new songs to see what they sound like and then go back in and record them, so I was there witnessing the writing, which I love as you get to see the ideas at a very early stage, so if you include the mixing I would say I was on there for about a year - I only work on one record at a time so it that was a year in the life of Dravs! It might sound shocking to some, but I had a very nice year and listening to the record I think it was worth it."

More photos of Coldplay at KROQ (19th October 2011):

Photos courtesy of KROQ Radio @ Flickr

Our next featured Mylo Xyloto album review comes from the Daily Mail who have published their review of the new album today. For some their rating image isn't working so we don't know what they've given it - keep an eye on their link for that. Their review is positive and focuses on the collaboration with Rihanna, and the review is entitled "Coldplay are HOT: Rihanna cheers up Chris Martin, making his fifth album a triumph". However, they do criticise the flow of the concept storyline, writing: "The concept is a nebulous one, and it is hard to detect any real narrative from the way in which the tracks are sequenced." Their overall verdict: Big beats, bigger choruses. Read on for the review...

Three years ago, as Coldplay were about to release their fourth album, a tetchy Chris Martin seemed at odds with the world. He walked out of an interview when asked about his wife, Gwyneth Paltrow, and cut short an appearance on Radio 4 by saying he didn’t like ‘having to talk about things’.

These days, the mood in Britain’s biggest band is brighter. Coldplay will still be nervous about their enigmatically-titled fifth album, Mylo Xyloto, but on the surface at least, they appear more relaxed: reaching No 1 in 36 countries, as they did with their last album, works wonders for your self-esteem. Their confidence will have been further boosted by a triumphant Glastonbury appearance in June, when they outshone fellow headliners U2 to deliver a masterclass in the art of entertaining an open-air crowd.

They even defied conventional festival wisdom by successfully introducing a handful of new songs. That self-belief shines through again on Mylo Xyloto. The fact that several of these songs were played live before the band began recording has given them an immediacy that might have been lacking had they only been worked on in a darkened studio. Whatever else his critics say about him — and there are plenty who still find him insufferable — it is hard to deny Chris Martin’s ability to produce a catchy, crowd-pleasing hook.

There are plenty of those here, with the surging Hurts Like Heaven, the song with which the band opened their Glastonbury set, and current single Paradise, powered by epic, sing-along choruses. The changes of direction, when they arrive, are subtle. With former Roxy Music man Brian Eno prominent, the electronic undercurrents are more pronounced than before. More surprising is the incorporation of pop, dance and urban elements. Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall is enhanced by propulsive, danceable rhythms. There is a guest appearance, too, from soul queen Rihanna, who duets on Princess Of China, a jittery synth-pop workout.

But despite Martin’s high-profile friendship with rap mogul Jay-Z and his wife Beyonce, Coldplay haven’t suddenly plunged headlong into hip-hop and R&B in a cringe-worthy bid to up their street cred. As befits four privately educated musicians who met at University College, London, theirs is a refined, middle-class appropriation of the electronic rhythms currently dominating the singles chart.

The pounding beats that bassist Guy Berryman and drummer Will Champion whip up at the beginning of Paradise might represent a departure of sorts, but the song is essentially a default Coldplay piano ballad, sung in a yearning falsetto and underscored by majestic strings and a heavenly choir.

So what is Mylo Xyloto all about? According to Martin, it is, wait for it, a concept album: a love story in which Mylo and Xyloto are the two main characters. If so, the concept is a nebulous one, and it is hard to detect any real narrative from the way in which the tracks are sequenced. There is, however, a little more substance than previously. Since becoming a father, Martin has discovered an ability to write lyrics that are heartfelt and tender. And like all good love stories, the album ends on a life-affirming note, as Up With The Birds adds an atmospheric finale.

It might not win them any fresh admirers, but Mylo Xyloto will delight existing Coldplay fans.

October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! (Updated: 20th October) [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

Guy Berryman has one of the best jobs in the world: he plays to stadiums full of adoring fans, has sold 50 million records and yet is still able to sit unrecognised in a London pub and nurse a pint on a lazy Sunday. To mark the release of the band's fifth album Mylo Xyloto, Guy talks to GQ Magazine about partying with A-ha, his obsession with Leica cameras and the schoolboy errors of disco style... (Full discussion on this article is at the Coldplay forum now. [thanks Skuze23])

GQ.com: What's the most impressive live act you've ever seen?

Guy Berryman: I was completely blown away by Grace Jones. I saw her about a year ago in the Roundhouse in London. She's an absolute superstar. If she comes around again, I'd urge you to go and get some tickets.

Do you have any style rules?

Just keep it simple. When you over-think what you're wearing, that's when wardrobe malfunctions tend to happen. At school, there was an annual school disco and I'd be standing in my bedroom wondering what to wear for hours on end. Eventually I'd arrive at a decision that was just the most ridiculous costume you could have ever devised - I think it was probably knitted Christmas jumpers on top of buttoned-up white shirts. So keep it simple and stick to what you know.

Where's your favourite place to go out for a drink?

I usually go down to the Box nightclub on Wednesday nights, which is always a very "interesting" evening. If I want something a bit quieter, my favourite place to go is a pub called The Horseshoe up in Hampstead which has wicked food and a great vibe.

Which camera would you recommend?

My favourite is a Leica M7. It's just a very simple, well-made and robust. The design haven't changed very much in 100 years. I only shoot on film. I like the quality, the grain and the imperfections. It offers me something much more rewarding than any digital camera can give me. I believe the extra expense is worth it.

Which photographers do you admire?

A great Japanese photographer called Daido Moriyama and a German photographer called Thomas Struth who is quite an abstract artist. But in complete contrast, I also love pictures by Helmut Newton and David Bailey.

You've had a long-running collaboration with A-ha - were you always a fan?

Magne Furuholmen is a very dear friend of mine. A-ha are a classic pop band and they've got some brilliant songs. I'd say "The Living Daylights" was one of my favourite Bond tunes: regardless of it being a Bond song, it stands alone as a great piece of music.

Last year, you announced that you were teaming up with your brother to start an antique business...

I didn't announce that and in fact it isn't strictly true! My brother Mark moved to Sweden and he was collecting up really amazing painted rustic Swedish furniture. He began a business. He now works for a festival called Peace and Love over there in Sweden, so he doesn't have much time to concentrate on that any more. But there's certainly a big barn full of great furniture next to his house.

In 2008, you ran the London marathon. Any advice?

I started training for the marathon two months before it happened, which I wouldn't really recommend. It is do-able, but I think if you want to do it safely and properly, you should give yourself four to six months to train for it. Find a training schedule and stick to it. Don't try and overdo it. But don't do too little - 26 miles is a long way and the last four miles are going to really kill you. A good pair of trainers is essential. You've just got to have a clear focus really. The longest that I ran before the full 26 miles was 20 miles, which is just one way of doing it. I think some people might do more a little bit more than that before the big day, but it's all about keeping your legs fully charged for the big day itself.

What other challenges have you set yourself?

I like to be constantly learning things. I started training for a private pilot's licence, so I've been doing flying lessons over the last month or so. It is a particularly difficult! Other than just fly the aeroplane, you have to learn air law, navigation, meteorology, radio communications and you have to understand the effects and conditions of flying on the human body. You have about seven written exams as well as your flying time which you have to clock up. It's a big undertaking

What's the most ridiculous rumour you've ever heard - Lindsay Lohan chasing you round a festival?

We get all kinds of rumours! Sometimes there's bits of reality in them and sometimes they are completely fictitious. But we live in such a bubble in our studio up in London and we tend not to venture outside of it too much, so there's a lot of things that people talk about and say about us outside of that bubble that we don't really pay too much attention to.

October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

Our next Mylo Xyloto album review comes from our friends at The Upcoming (bookmark their site for everything - thought-provoking stories, cultural insights and interesting news!) They give the new album a perfect 5/5 rating. As well as short reviews for each of the tracks... their album review in a nutshell? It's: "This album is Coldplay’s most pop and widest work to date, it is a 44-minute adventure in the world of music: immersed in a waterfall of sounds and emotions, you just need to close your eyes and let yourself go." Read on for the review...

Coldplay’s comeback to the music scene is their umpteenth challenge to reinvent themselves after the worldwide success of Viva la Vida Or Death And All Of His Friends in 2008.

The album opens with the short M.X. As it happens in a spectacular haute-cuisine restaurant, Coldplay wants to make sure that every single listener begins the journey from the same point: 43 seconds of mood-setting magic. Hurts Like Heaven is the kick-start of the album, an up-tempo song reminiscent of Arcade Fire’s Keep The Car Running and Bruce Springsteen’s Dancing In The Dark. Although the structure of the song is not distant from their previous works, the production is the farthest that Coldplay has ever been: a waterfall of synthesised sounds and the voice predominantly on vocoder.

The passage to Paradise is marked by abrupt, opulent strings which open the most ambitious track of the whole record. Written to climb worldwide charts, the English rockers confirmed themselves to be capable of creating something great as well as accessible. However, it is track number four Charlie Brown which is the highlight of the album: introduced by some childish, electronic sounds (it might remind you of the adults’ voices in Snoopy), it showcases a massive, unforgettable solo, a set of intriguing lyrics – “I took the car downtown where the lost boys meet // I took the car downtown and took what they offered me // We’ll run wild, we’ll be glowing in the dark” – and a mellow outro on the piano.

Next on the record is Us Against the World, a ballad laying on an epic organ and acoustic guitars: a Fix You without its rock momentum. The album takes a breath with M.M.I.X., a quick instrumental to release the tension. Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall is the perfect good-feel moment, the anthem of this new Coldplay-era; pop lyrics and catchy melodies perfectly fit within this concept album.

Conversely Major Minus is the roughest and rockest moment, loud guitars and vocals materialise into this dry piece. From here on there is always an alternation between up-tempo and slow tracks: UFO is a very simple acoustic song, all guitar and voice, that gets more sophisticated in the chorus. A bass-like string synth help guarantee cohesion in the track list.

It follows Princess Of China, the most rumoured track of the album: one long verse, one chorus, an extensive instrumental and a prolonged final. A very unusual structure for the first Coldplay song featuring a lead vocal not belonging to the band: young R&B icon Rihanna. Up In Flames demonstrates how the group is capable of making a plain song sound monumental. Clearly inspired by Neil Young’s falsetto of Philadelphia, it is disarmingly touching.

A Hopeful Transmission is the last break before the final rush: Don’t Let It Break Your Heart, a vibrant hymn to joy with a subtle flavour of melancholy. Up With The Birds commences as a sad goodbye to this kaleidoscopic journey through the world of Mylo Xyloto. However, there is a turning point right in the middle of the song: Up With The Birds actually becomes a happy farewell.

This album is Coldplay’s most pop and widest work to date, it is a 44-minute adventure in the world of music: immersed in a waterfall of sounds and emotions, you just need to close your eyes and let yourself go.

October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

In another extensive interview published online today, The Daily Mail has been writing about the inner workings of Coldplay from their Bakery/Beehive headquarters in North London. In this remarkably candid interview, Coldplay discuss the trappings of fame and Chris Martin even goes as far as discussing his relationship with Gwyneth Paltrow. Other topics include the threat from Justin Bieber – and why they might be about to call it a day (we bet they don't, but NME like to stir shit up so its all over the internet by now). Louise Gannon gets the final word with Coldplay... (Full discussion on this article is at the Coldplay forum now. [thanks Mimixxx])

Tucked away on the wrong side of a smart north London neighbourhood, flanked by a grim housing estate, lies the small, squat HQ of the most successful band Britain has produced in the past decade: Coldplay. There is absolutely nothing to suggest the building is home to über-rich rock stars and a hangout for Hollywood royalty – Gwyneth Paltrow, the wife of lead singer Chris Martin.

The cramped lobby is largely taken up by a mountain bike and bits of cycling paraphernalia, and the narrow stairway is sprayed with home-made graffiti (the theme of the band’s new album, Mylo Xyloto). Standing outside, £30 million worth of Coldplay – in the form of drummer Will Champion – is making a call on his mobile. No one at the bus stop opposite even gives him a second glance. As far as X Factor expectations go, Coldplay have done something very, very wrong. These guys are just not living the dream. During the course of the afternoon, three (Martin, Champion and Johnny Buckland) of the four members struggle to think of any big, flash purchase they have made in the past decade (‘I don’t actually own a car,’ says Martin. ‘But then I agree with Noel Gallagher. He once said to me, “Singers just shouldn’t drive. It’s a concentration thing, we’re dreamers”’).

Buckland says he has bought a scooter. Bassist Guy Berryman (the man Martin describes as ‘fulfilling the rock star fantasies’) cites a 1952 AMI vinyl jukebox as his ‘prize possession’ along with his Apple gadgets. Champion doesn’t even own his own drum kit. ‘They’re too noisy and to be honest it’s not the easiest thing to fit in a home with children. I have them in the studio and Yamaha make them for the tours.’

All of them cycle round London, do supermarket shops, use buses and Tubes without being recognised. Although Martin has, he admits, managed to do one ‘clichéd rock-star thing’ by marrying a movie star, Paltrow. ‘When we did our last gigs at the O2, I went there by Tube,’ he says. ‘I was with all the Coldplay fans and not one single person recognised me,’ he says. ‘It’s true. When I’m on my own it just doesn’t happen. In fact the other day this cab driver stopped me by our office and said, “You know, you look a lot like that singer, Chris Martin.”

'For some reason I just said, “Do you know what, I am him.” He then went, “Ha, ha, ha… You know he lives round here, don’t you?” I swear on my life that’s true.’

But this is the very point of Coldplay. They play to sell-out venues around the world, they sell albums (50 million record sales), they are one of the very few UK bands to win Grammys (seven), they headline Glastonbury, they turn down offers worth £52 million from Gap and Diet Coke to use their music in commercials (old-fashioned musical integrity) and (if you listen closely) their tracks are regularly used in the background music of the Today programme. They don’t, however, do celebrity or play up to being rock stars. It’s not hard to work out why Martin goes to such great lengths to avoid hanging out in public with his wife (he’d prefer to be unrecognised than photographed by the paparazzi).

Any mention of Paltrow is usually banned from interviews with the band. But it’s worth a try. There has been much speculation about their marriage. The fact that Martin is rarely pictured with her and never talks about her has led to rumours of rifts appearing in celebrity magazines on a regular basis. Martin has told me I am only one of three people to have heard the complete new album days ahead of its release. But some weeks ago Paltrow tweeted: ‘Who do I have to bang around here to get an advance copy of the Coldplay album?’

Does this mean Paltrow – mother of his two children, Apple and Moses – is one of the three? Martin shakes his head with a slight smile: ‘That comment created a few ripples. She’s very good on Twitter. But no she hasn’t got an album.’ He pauses. ‘She and all our wives hear things in their very raw form, on the piano or whatever. But the people you love, you don’t want to play them anything until you think it’s worth playing.’

I ask him whether he watches her movies when he is away on tour to remind him of her. ‘Well, she’s a good actress. I am biased but I am also right. The Royal Tenenbaums is one of her best performances.’

Just the day before we meet, Paltrow – who plays a woman having an affair with a married man in her new movie Contagion – hit the headlines by admitting to being a ‘romantic and realist’, adding: ‘I know people that I respect and admire and look up to who have had extra-marital affairs. If death by virus was a punishment for extra-marital affairs there would only be three dudes left in this world right now.’

It was a comment that sparked even more speculation about their marriage. To ask him about it is a true test of a rock-star ego. Many would storm out of the room. Martin looks slightly stunned. ‘Did she say that? I don’t read any of these things.’

Then he pauses and grins. ‘Right, well, I’m a notorious love rat and I think that’s what she’s going on about.’

He laughs, to make the point he’s sending himself up. Scratch the surface and underneath you’ll find an eternal student who just won’t let himself fall down the celebrity well. On stage they are gods; off stage they are determined to remain just four ordinary blokes. If they don’t (and Martin admits he is usually the culprit) he has invented a self-imposed punishment – getting horribly drunk on gin and Ribena. It was a measure put into place in 1999 when he tried to sack Champion. ‘I have my moments – usually twice every album – when I basically lose it. Someone gets through your armour and one of the guys pulls me back. We all know each other so well, we keep each other in check.’

Which is why, back at Coldplay HQ, rules are in place to make sure Martin – lead singer, husband of Paltrow, friend of Jay-Z, Beyoncé and Rihanna, the one everyone wants to talk to – is given the same treatment as every other band member. Like REM and U2, Coldplay operate as a democracy; all profits are shared equally (though Martin writes most of the songs) and in photographs or interviews, Martin refuses to be singled out. You talk to the band together or not at all. In this setting, with the three men he met aged 18 at University College London, he is entirely comfortable. He is bigger, more gym-fit than he seems in pictures, and he looks younger than his 33 years.

Martin and Buckland clicked when they worked as cleaners to get extra cash. ‘We bonded on a level of, “God, these sheets smell disgusting,”’ says Martin. ‘And, “Do I really have to clean this toilet?”’ laughs Buckland. ‘We were like, “Man, we’ve got to get a band together instead of this,”’ finishes Martin. All four were middle-class, privately educated boys with a passion for music. This makes them sound cool. Martin laughs. ‘Not cool. Ever. I’ve never been cool and I don’t really care about being cool. It’s just an awful lot of time and hair gel wasted. At school I was a medium-clever geek. If you’re at public school (he was at Sherbourne) and you’re not that good at rugby, you spend quite a few important years of your life feeling like a real loser. We’ve never been about cool. What’s happened to us is more about showing that the geeks at school can get there in the end. And you have to stay true to who you are. The root of all this is to do with our friendship. There’s a song on the album called Us Against The World, and that’s definitely the feeling at the moment. We’ve been though every single cliché that a band goes through, from addictions to film-star marriages.’

Addictions? This is a band with a rule that any member using hard drugs will be kicked out. The handsome, chiselled Berryman volunteers: ‘I was probably the most extreme. We’ve done all those things, had a great amount of fun, but times are different now. We’re all a bit older and wiser.’

Martin shakes his head. ‘We don’t really talk about that kind of thing. But I always feel I’m three friends away from it being just me and my keyboard on a P&O ferry, so for me this has always been about keeping us together. Friends.’

Their friendship has of course been staggeringly successful. The band’s last album, Viva La Vida Or Death And All His Friends, was the best-selling album of 2008, and before that their three previous albums, from Parachutes to X&Y, have achieved the sort of dizzying worldwide sales figures that a band like Oasis could only dream of. However, they seem genuinely nervous about how the new album will be received. Martin shrugs. ‘Normally any time we do something good we can rest assure there will be thousands of people who will happily tell us how bad it is.’

It is true. Coldplay as a band does get a battering from the cool crowd, from Liam Gallagher (‘I ******* hate Coldplay’) to Martin’s hero, Bono. They get accused of being too middle-class, too middle-of-the-road, too worthy (Martin is a vegetarian, the band off-set their carbon imprint and do huge amounts for Fairtrade and poverty charities). ‘There was even a joke on Peep Show about how millions of people like Coldplay and millions of people like the Nazis,’ says Martin. Did it get to him? ‘Yes. I’ve got to be honest, it brings you right down.’

You wonder why on Earth he doesn’t just think of all his millions and shrug it off? I think it’s part of being English, particularly if you are middle-class – you’re always looking to be reminded that you are no good and you are always actually embarrassed about being successful.’ Champion adds: ‘We have a British insecurity, like we’re doing all right but we could be doing better.‘

‘And I definitely think people aren’t going to buy your record because your last one was good,’ adds Martin. ‘This could be our last album. It’s the distillation of three years’ work and right now I can’t imagine where another one would come from. Now we have Justin Bieber and Adele to compete with and they’re a lot younger. We have to have the energy to put as much effort into our work as they do. If it’s over, it’s over and I can live with that. The most important thing always is to proceed as if every album is the last and not expect anything more.’

So no chance of getting close to a 50th anniversary like the Rolling Stones? Martin laughs. ‘Maybe it would be Hawthorne Cider Presents… at some pub in Dorset, just not necessarily Wembley Stadium, but I think we’re all OK with that.’

It would be wrong, however, to entirely fall for the idea that Coldplay are the most humble band in rock. And while Champion describes them as ‘not being imprisoned by the trappings of fame’, Martin himself is happy to admit to enjoying flying by private jet. ‘It is actually awesome – but we do also do a lot of international flights. We are the ones in security taking ages putting on our shoes because we always wear ones with tons of laces and end up annoying everyone.’

Rihanna performs on the new album, doing the vocals for Princess Of China (Martin says he ‘spluttered like Hugh Grant’ when he asked her personally to do it) and Martin has become a new darling of the American music scene, working with Jay-Z and hanging out on yachts. He and Paltrow have been asked to be godparents to Beyoncé’s baby, which is due in February. As Martin relaxes, he is more open about the glamorous side of his life. ‘Their fame is more a real thing. And with people like Beyoncé and Lady Gaga… well it’s different for girls. If you’re very attractive you get more attention, you need more attention – like Beyoncé. People would stare at her if she was a bus driver.’ He looks up, turquoise eyes widened.

‘I’m telling you, it isn’t like that for me – for us. People walk right past us. I’m not complaining. It may seem weird but I wouldn’t want it any other way.’

October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

A few long articles have surfaced from various sources this weekend as the Coldplay juggernaut goes into overdrive, ready for the release of Mylo Xyloto. This from the Sunday Herald Sun (Australian), discusses Coldplay's approach to Rihanna for Princess Of China (nothing we didn't already know), Brian Eno (again, not new) and also the development of one of Coldplay's most popular new tracks - Charlie Brown. That part at least (around the middle of the article), makes interesting reading... [Full discussion on this article is at the Coldplay forum now.]

He is a rock star millionaire, fronts arguably the biggest band of his generation and is married to an Oscar-winning actor, but a beautiful woman can still turn Chris Martin to jelly. On its fifth album, Mylo Xyloto, which is released on Friday, Coldplay has brought in a guest singer for the first time and front man Martin says that the prospect of asking R&B goddess Rihanna to do the honours reduced him to an awkward, bumbling mess.

Martin had originally written the song in question, Princess of China, with the Barbadian beauty in mind, thinking he would offer a song to her as he had done for artists such as Jamelia and his former girlfriend, Natalie Imbruglia. But after showing it to his band mate Guy Berryman, they decided it would be better done as a duo for the album they were working on...

So at a star-studded New Year's Eve bash in Las Vegas last year, Martin plucked up the courage, which was, as the self-deprecating Englishman acknowledges, not unlike asking the hot girl to the school dance. "That was exactly how it felt," Martin says with a chuckle, sharing a couch with guitarist Jonny Buckland in a New York studio. "It was like in Four Weddings and a Funeral when Hugh Grant chases after the girl and goes 'do you think, um possibly if I didn't say, er, how would you feel about not not singing on this?' I was like a bumbling mess."

It might have taken him a while to get there but Martin says the inclusion of the duet, the embracing of new sounds from dance to hip-hop to R&B, and the decision to make Mylo Xyloto a concept album are all good indicators of where Coldplay is as a band in 2011. Having arrived with a bang more than a decade ago with the album Parachutes - and its monster hit Yellow - and following it up with the even bigger, multiple Grammy-winning A Rush Of Blood To the Head in 2002, Coldplay was having something of an identity crisis after the release of 2005 album X&Y.

It was around that time The New York Times labelled the British foursome "the most insufferable band of the decade" and as a band whose ascent coincided with that of social media and the blogosphere, the level of vitriol seemed far out of proportion to their achievements or perceived crimes. But from that baptism of fire came a revelation. "I think once you accept that hatred then you can focus on entertaining the people who like you or want to like you," says Martin. "But definitely for a period, probably around X&Y, when we hadn't yet learned how to switch off Google and you could put in Coldplay and see all the results. But I think everybody for a while was a bit overwhelmed by the mass of opinion."

The band emerged stronger from the experience, enlisting the help of sonic guru Brian Eno for Viva La Vida Or Death and All His Friends, which became the world's highest-selling album of 2008, with more than nine million copies sold. Buckland says the new album is very much a development from its predecessor and builds on the confidence and focus that Eno brought to bear. The band coined a term for the input of the man who first found fame with 1970s act Roxy Music and went on to produce seven albums for U2: "Enoxification."

"It's a description of how he fits into the process," says Martin. "It isn't producing - it's his own weird thing. He plays in the room as a band member - but it's so hard to explain what he does."

Buckland has a stab: "He allows us to feel free and to feel like it's OK to look stupid and to do things that maybe don't work. The main thing he brings is just an enjoyment of discovering new things."

Indeed, the seeds for Mylo Xyloto were sown just a week after the release of Viva La Vida, when Eno wrote the band a letter telling them they were on the right track - but could do even better. "I think if it was from anyone else you would tell them to f--- off," says Martin. "But because it's him - and he has done his body of work ... If he says 'I'd like to keep working with you because I think you can improve' then you would be a fool not to take him up on that."

Such was the band's ambition that the initial plan was to make two albums - one a more subdued, mostly acoustic affair, possibly as a soundtrack to an animated film, and the other a more upbeat, dance-influenced effort. The problem was that one kept intruding on the other and the band realised that creating some kind of false distinction between the projects was in fact holding them back.

"We have a song called Charlie Brown, which was the centrepiece of this other record we started first," says Martin. "We were playing the riff on an accordion and Guy came in one morning and said 'I'm afraid I have to put my foot down. I don't want to speak out of turn, but I will not allow this song to be played on an accordion - that has to go in with the Mylo bunch'. So then we thought - let's just make one album."

The solution to reconciling all of the disparate styles and sounds they had been working on came slowly. Elements of the soundtrack idea lent themselves to a concept album, which Martin initially described as "a love story with a happy ending". He is, however, quick to point out that it's a loose term without the "dragons and mountains" that can turn a concept into caricature and have given the format such a bad name over the years.

"It's a concept in as much as it is trying to make a small, tangible story out of the mass of confusion that is everyone's daily life," says Martin. "On the surface it is supposed to be two characters in a big, oppressive, urban atmosphere who are both a bit lost and find each other and take on the enemy so to speak. But really it's just a collection of personal feelings presented in that shell."

The added bonus was to write something that was to be listened to in its entirety, a rarity in the age of digital downloads and custom-made playlists. Despite having had a string of hit singles from Yellow to Clocks to Viva La Vida, Martin is adamant Coldplay is best suited to the longer album format and arguing he could never write a single as good at Lady Gaga's Bad Romance. "People barely listen to whole songs any more, never mind whole albums, so we thought let's go the other way and make the best album we possibly can," observes Buckland. "We wanted to make the most meaningful and coherent 45 minutes of music that we could."

Five albums in, Coldplay remains a strange mix of self-assuredness and insecurity. During this interview, which took place weeks after the band had delivered the finished album to the label but a month before its release, both Martin and Buckland admit to being nervous about how it will be received. "If you really care about something and you put everything into it - whether it's an album or a cake - you are a bit nervous when people are about to taste it," says Martin. "It actually gets harder because you hope things will be assessed for themselves and not too much because of your history or the way you are perceived."

That said, Martin and his band mates also seem more comfortable with where they fit into the music pantheon. Just a few years ago, as the band was entering its second decade, Martin said he felt acutely the pressure of producing something truly great and hinted the band could split sooner rather than later. The band to which they are most often compared, U2, was viewed as a yardstick both internally and externally, with Martin mostly admitting that Coldplay came up short. But their newfound sense of experimentation - and their enduring success - has also brought liberation and acceptance.

"I think if there is one thing that we have tried to avoid on our fifth record it's that feeling of trying to be somebody else," Martin says. "There are a couple of moments on the new record where you can't really hear what the influences are, which is possibly a good thing. I think that once you accept that you can never outdo The Beatles then you can relax a bit. No matter what happens you can never be the biggest band ever."

October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

As we tweeted a few days ago, Rolling Stone rated Mylo Xyloto a 3.5/5, which according to their marking system gives Coldplay an album that's somewhere between 'good' and 'excellent'. Key tracks to look out for according to RS are Princess Of China and Hurts Like Heaven. The review comes with a colourful cartoon animated image which reflects the music. Choruses are bigger, textures grander and the optimism more optimistic. Overall an uplifting review for an uplifting album. You can read more discussion on this new review at the Coldplay forum forum now. Read on for the Rolling Stone review transcription and scans... [thanks oldmuckers & Baw8cc]

In the three years since Coldplay’s last album, the world’s problems have gotten a little more urgent. A cratering economy, riots from Tahrir to Tottenham, the prolonged ubiquity of the Kardashians – these are things that can’t be solved with a lullaby, even from the biggest band to emerge in the 21st century. Chris Martin knows this. But Coldplay’s fifth album–and most ambitious yet–suggests Martin cares too much not to at least try to help.

Coldplay recently entered their second decade together – the same point Springsteen made Born in the USA and U2 made Achtung Baby – So it comes as no surprise they’d want a zeitgeist-y, big-statement album of their own. On Mylo Xyloto, the choruses are bigger, the textures grander, the optimism more optimistic. It’s a bear-hug record for a bear-market world.

Aided again by Brian Eno, Coldplay are still dabbling in the kind of cool-weird artiness they truly went for on 2008’s Viva la Vida. But where that album sometimes seemed like a self-concious attempt to diversify their sound, with a world-music vibe and U2-style sound effects, this time Coldplay have integrated the “Enoxification” (as they call it) into their own down-the-middle core: Check out the cascading choral vocals that augment Martin’s soaring refrain on “Paradise.” Prominent elements prop up the sonic cathedrals: Jonny Buckland’s guitar, which is riffier and more muscular than ever, and Euro-house synths that wouldn’t be out of place at a nightclub in Ibiza.

Martin says Mylo Xyloto was inspired by 1970s New York graffiti and the Nazi-resistance movement known as the White Rose- it’s probably no coincidence both were about young people embracing art in times of turmoil. Here, Coldplay rage on their own in their own lovably goofy way. On the rave-thinged “Every Teardrop is a Waterfall,” Martin imagines a revolution powered by dancing kids. “Hurts like Heaven” might be the first Coldplay tune to which you can bust something resembling a move. The lyrics seem to be about fighting The Man – “Don’t’ let ‘em take control!” – but Martin sounds ebullient over a sproingy New Wave beat.

Explicit personal statements aren’t really Martin’s thing; he’s in the uplift business. Mylo Xyloto suggests he’s fully embraced his role as a not-terribly-cool guy who’s good at preaching perseverance, in a voice that’s warm and milky like afternoon tea. By the time he croons, “Don’t Let it Break Your Heart!” over “Where the Streets Have No Name”-style guitar sparkle near the album’s end, you can’t help but think he’s an inspiration peddler who believes what he’s belting.

Oddly enough, the best moments are the darker ones. “Princess of China” is a ballad about loss and regret, co-starring Rihanna. It’s a partnership that probably came together over champagne brunch at Jay-Z’s, but its-fuzz groove is offhandedly seductive. It’s followed up by “Up in Flames,” a minimalist slow jam. Martin sings nakedly about how break-ups with people can feel like the end of the world, or maybe it’s about the actual end of the world. Either way, as end-times lullabies go, it’s pretty sweet.

KEY TRACKS: “Hurts Like Heaven,” “Princess of China”

Latest update to October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

Up next to review Mylo Xyloto is the BBC Music website with a short yet succinct and relatively positive article of the new album. There is no rating and no large song previews, but they do focus most of their attention on the balance of the album. You can read more discussion on this new review at the Coldplay forum forum now. We'll try and cram in as many media reviews of the album before and after it drops... whenever that may be. Read on for the BBC review... [thanks andrea25]

Don’t Coldplay love their Xs and their Ys? And their enigmatic album titles? After 2005’s X&Y and 2008’s Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends comes Mylo Xyloto. Well, it beats Coldplay 5. But any title that needs a pronunciation guide (it’s "My-lo zy-letoe") sounds like it’s trying a bit too hard. Maybe Chris Martin still yearns for something that infers the depth and gravitas of a Bono or Thom Yorke. The album is apparently a concept work, "based on a love story with a happy ending," Martin claims, and inspired by old-school American graffiti and the anti-Nazi pacifist White Rose Movement: "It's about being free to be yourself and to express yourself among negative surroundings." But the lyrics are still typically Martin’s life-affirming, anthem-forming and plain-speaking as ever, more ABC than MYLO XYLOTO...

The same goes for the music. Bassist Guy Berryman said in 2009, "It's time to take our music down different directions and really explore other avenues," and, in name alone, this set suggests Coldplay might finally do an Achtung Baby; they might rip it up and start again, in the presence of said U2 LP’s producer Brian Eno, who also worked on Viva la Vida. If the addition of electronic undertows, instrumental snippets (the title-track, M.M.I.X., A Hopeful Transmission) linking many of the tracks and the presence of Rihanna on Princess of China count as "other avenues", then job well done. But Mylo Xyloto is much more a brilliant, shiny and emphatic reinstatement of the euphoric hooks and cuddly ballads that have served the band so well. Case in point: Paradise, where melting strings and church organ feed into a brilliant chorus line that equal parts Fix You and Viva la Vida’s title-track. But the main vocal chorus doesn’t arrive until over two minutes in, building the tension; the pay-off is both simple and devastating. It’s the equal of Yellow, and when Coldplay return to Glastonbury it will take the roof off the sky.

Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall goes one step further than Paradise by lifting Vida la Vida’s "who-hoa!" hook, suggesting Coldplay can’t truly comprehend new avenues. U2-shaped echoes still run through the deep and wide canyons of their landscaped sound – Major Minus features The Edge-patented guitar chatter, but it’s nevertheless a triumph. Charlie Brown has one of those Coldplay-patented sun-breaking-through-clouds moments; Us Against the World (the sentiment that unites the graffiti and anti-Nazi camps) is the key wistful/cuddly ballad alongside Up in Flames, a successful grafting of soul onto the Coldplay model, helped by an understated falsetto and the simplest of piano parts (echoes of Parachutes’ gorgeous Everything’s Not Lost).

The closing Up With the Birds, which samples Leonard Cohen, is a serene finale that shows Coldplay understand the change of dynamics more than the dynamics of change. Better this than the nominally Euro-disco bent of Princess of China, where Rihanna’s presence feels more of a marketing tool than a creative necessity, and there’s yet another "who-ay-oh-oh!" chant just in case Coldplay were straying too far from their remit. This appears to support Martin’s message of expressing the freedom to be yourself under negative surroundings – not to change just because critics of the band tell them they should. Mylo Xyloto may have an oblique title but it’s a triumph because the music is anything but.

October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

Special guests SFTW are side of stage at Cape Town Stadium as Coldplay prepare for their first ever show in South Africa, The Sun writes, in a new article published today. And as with all their gigs, Coldplay are ready to give their all tonight. After an hour of vocal warm-ups, the band are geeing each other up with just minutes to go. Full discussion on this latest article is at the Coldplay forum now. [thanks Mimixxx])

Drummer Will Champion performs some eye-watering leg stretches before they gather in a hug. Chris Martin, Jonny Buckland, Guy Berryman, Will, unofficial fifth member and manager Phil Harvey and, er, SFTW after Chris drags me into the huddle. Then they run on stage to play new tracks Mylo Xyloto and Hurts Like Heaven. "We're so happy to be here finally, after 12 years. It took us that long to get a visa. We apologise," jokes Chris to an ecstatic crowd who are being showered with paper butterflies.

All day the city's been buzzing about Coldplay. The customs officers at the airport ask: "Are you here for Coldplay?" while fans queuing outside the stadium are treated to a pre-show of sorts as the band arrive to do a sound check. Cape Town is one of three spectacular Coldplay shows SFTW has witnessed this summer in the run-up to the release of fifth album Mylo Xyloto — the others being Glastonbury and Lollapalooza festival in Chicago.

It's been 11 years since the band — who all met as students in the late Nineties at University College London — had their first Top 40 hit, Shiver. In the band's dressing room frontman Chris, 34, says: "We have been Coldplay all our adult lives. So when we re-emerge every three years, we realise pop stars are getting a lot younger. We forget we're getting older because we're together all the time. We've not seen each other grow up, we think we are the same age as when we started."

Coldplay's last album, 2008's Viva La Vida Or Death And All His Friends, was a real step forward for the band. Back then Chris told SFTW: "It's a bit of a risk because there isn't a Yellow."

Working with super-producer Brian Eno, they experimented. And the marching drums, spine-tingling atmospherics, strings and timpani all paid off. The album became the world's biggest-selling album of 2008. But Chris explains: "Not in any individual country, which is funny. We were not the most popular band in any country... just the world!"

And so follow-up album, the unusually titled Mylo Xyloto, has been made by a band finally at ease with themselves. No longer worrying if they are perceived as cool or naff, Coldplay simply don't care as long as the music they make meets their own approval. Guitarist Jonny, 34, says: "We've spent so long being solely bothered about what the five of us, Brian Eno and (producer) Markus Dravs think that we are happy with it."

Chris adds: "Each song goes through such a harsh selection process just to get recorded. It makes The X Factor seem like a walk in the park. We scrapped a full album before this. But we always do that." Will, 33, says: "We'd started an acoustic album but then we wrote Paradise and knew the acoustic thing didn't have legs."

Bassist Guy, 33, adds: "We've been brave and bold with these songs. There are more modern, urban and dance influences in there. We approached it with a lot of confidence."

The last few years have clearly been a learning curve for Coldplay. Chris says: "I'll be honest. On the last album a few things happened that we'd never experienced before, like lawsuits and really vitriolic criticism. After all that hurt it makes you tighter and adds fire to everything. It was a closing of ranks."

Coldplay were accused of plagiarism three times for their song Viva La Vida. First by American band Creaky Boards and then Yusuf Islam claimed it was similar to his song Foreigner Suite. Creaky Boards retracted while Yusuf declared he wasn't angry and would "love to sit down and have a cup of tea with Coldplay to let them know it's OK".

However, in December 2008, American guitarist Joe Satriani filed a copyright infringement suit against Coldplay, claiming Viva La Vida borrowed from his instrumental track If I Could Fly. The case was dismissed in September 2009 by the California Central District Court with both parties potentially agreeing to an out-of-court settlement. Chris says: "We got to a very low place on the last record where we felt not very popular. But it was refreshing as it made us start from scratch. A clean slate. So many people had made up their minds about us already that we had nothing to lose."

Mylo Xyloto is an album bursting with colours. Paradise and Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall are up there with their catchiest of singles. It's Coldplay at their poppiest with huge urban and R&B influences. And no more so than on Princess Of China, which features Rihanna. Chris says: "We love Rihanna's music. We love so many different kinds of music that there is really nothing to lose by reflecting that in your record." It's a concept album following boy and girl characters — Mylo and Xyloto — in a scary and oppressive world.

Will says: "They fall in love and try to escape together, the songs following what happens. Charlie Brown is about running away while Paradise is about feeling lost. The ending is very powerful and about love conquering all."

Jonny adds: "People listen to albums as a whole a lot less now, but we wanted this one to be heard like that."

Mylo Xyloto sees Brian Eno take on a bigger role with Coldplay. No longer just a producer, Jonny says he was "like a band member", joining them to play keyboards. Chris laughs: "Last time he was a Dumbledore figure. He'd come in, do magic and then disappear, leaving cryptic clues to what we were supposed to do."

Guy adds: "But this time Brian was really doing what he loves doing best — sowing the seeds of ideas and letting them grow."

The album was recorded at their studio as well as on the road in Japan, Australia, LA and Chicago.Chris explains: "The morning of Lollapalooza we'd just finished the song Up In Flames. It was a Phileas Fogg recording session. Once Will agreed it was good then we knew we could hand the album in as he is our strictest member."

Chris says being away from his family — wife Gwyneth Paltrow, 39, and daughter Apple, seven, and son Moses, five — is hard but could be worse. He says: "It's not like being on an oil rig or being a soldier. We are talking about being away a week at a time and then you can meet them in Bognor or wherever you are going next. And I also buy a lot of Lego to take home."

After the show, we head off to a party at a club called Trinity. The band don't have a party-hard reputation but they are still in good spirits. Magician David Blaine is there, showing off his tricks to the band's crew, family and friends. Chris says: "Things have moved so fast for the band that we don't have a lot of time to reflect. We're so grateful for where we have got to, though sometimes it feels like a never-ending tour!" Jonny adds: "But we luckily don't share rooms any more."

"But we still get changed in a van like the old days," interrupts Chris. "Granted it's on the way to an aeroplane, but if you can't see each other in your underpants every day then you are not a real band any more."

So have Coldplay grown accustomed to the fame, headlining huge festivals like Glastonbury or playing to 50,000 fans a night? "It's never normal," says Chris. "But it's not as mad as it used to be. I only get recognised when I'm with my wife. And then they spot her, so that's great. I recently had a cab driver say to me, 'You look like that singer'. I said 'I am', and he just laughed. "But I never think of this as real life. On tour everything revolves around you so getting home is a head-f***, but something you need. One day you're headlining Wembley and the next you're arguing with a mum at school about parking. Now that is real life."

Mylo Xyloto is out on October 24. Coldplay's UK tour begins in Norwich on October 27.

October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

Chris Martin, is one of the world’s biggest rock stars, a species for whom tardiness is all but a right. Yet he was full of apologies when he popped through the door of a Midtown Manhattan restaurant, no entourage in sight, for a recent interview with the NYTimes this week. “I’m sorry I’m late,” he blurted, wearing a slightly stained “Don’t Mess With Texas” T-shirt and loudly colored sneakers, though he had no sunglasses, hat or any other means of celebrity disguise.

But Mr. Martin was actually five minutes early. And in a discussion about the band’s new album, Mylo Xyloto (Capitol), he focused on the “baggage,” as he put it, of being in Coldplay. For a man who has seen millions of faces and soft-rocked them all — his next appointment was flying to Brazil to perform at the enormous Rock in Rio festival — he seemed to know that rock superstardom is not what it used to be.

Having reached pop’s stratosphere just as the music industry was beginning its decadelong crash, Coldplay is perhaps the last in a line of great rock dinosaurs. Its uplifting, arena-filling hooks have helped it sell more than 40 million albums, a feat that scarcely seems repeatable today.

“They are one of the few bands of their generation able to transcend multiple radio formats: rock, alternative, Top 40,” said Tom Poleman, president of national programming platforms for the radio giant Clear Channel. “When you have that formula, it’s like striking gold.”

As baggage goes, that’s all good. But for almost its entire career, Coldplay has had to prove itself a worthy inheritor to the biggest-band title. Once that largely meant overcoming criticism that it was “Radiohead-lite.” Now, with the release of “Mylo Xyloto” on Oct. 24, Coldplay finds itself shouldering a strange burden as one of the only bands capable of sales to rival the juggernauts of pop — making the band’s success or failure freighted with symbolism about the commercial viability of rock.

And how do you make a great, old-fashioned rock album? If you are Mr. Martin — for whom the whole swaggering frontman thing has never come naturally — you start by watching Springsteen and Dylan videos.

“I was watching a lot about ‘Darkness on the Edge of Town,’ and a lot about ‘Blonde on Blonde’ and ‘Sgt. Pepper’s’ and all these real albums,” said Mr. Martin, who at 34 still has the glow of a young man amazed by his good fortune. “And I realized that we had to make a decision. Even though the album is an endangered species, can we try and make a coherent and good one, even if it’s like making a horse and cart at a Nascar conference?”

In conversation, Mr. Martin is as cheerful as his songs are moody, though he hardly seems to finish a sentence without a self-deprecating remark. Joking about the paparazzi who chase his wife, the actress Gwyneth Paltrow, he claims he is so uninteresting that he gets mistaken for actors from movies he wasn’t in: “I get more people approaching me about how good I was in ‘Napoleon Dynamite’ than being in Coldplay,” he said with a grin.

Coldplay is a 21st-century band with 20th-century ambitions, and for the most part it has achieved them. The band has remained consistently, monstrously popular even as rock has receded from the charts and shrunk as a radio format. Its last album, “Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends,” nabbed three Grammy Awards and became the world’s best-selling album of 2008, once again setting up great expectations.

There is perhaps no greater 20th-century rock ambition than the midcareer concept album. “Mylo Xyloto” is Coldplay’s stab at it, loosely structured as a love story set in an Orwellian dystopia. But while “concept album” often implies “sales disaster,” “Mylo Xyloto” is filled with the soaring melodies, soft piano and twinkling guitar that Coldplay fans expect, along with some new territory for the band to explore. It even features Rihanna on an R&B-leaning track, “Princess of China.”

Kevin Weatherly, program director at the influential Los Angeles rock station KROQ-FM, said “Mylo Xyloto” is full of potential hits. But he also credited the band with keeping its focus on creating complete albums.

“We live in a singles world these days,” Mr. Weatherly said, “and there are very few artists who do what Coldplay does, which is deliver full records with quality songs from start to finish.”

“Mylo Xyloto” went through various twists and turns in the 18 months the band worked on it. Jonny Buckland, the guitarist, called it a distillation of two planned albums, one acoustic and the other electronic. The songs are also connected to an abandoned animated film project, which might explain cinematic touches like several atmospheric interludes.

For help the band turned again to Brian Eno, the revered producer of David Bowie and Talking Heads, who coached Coldplay in their big reinvention on “Viva la Vida.” Mr. Eno gets a mysterious “enoxification” credit on the new album, but it was produced by Markus Dravs, Daniel Green and Rik Simpson. (Mr. Dravs, a former assistant to Mr. Eno, also has producer credits on Arcade Fire’s album “The Suburbs” and “Sigh No More” by Mumford and Sons.)

“Mylo Xyloto” brings some new colors to the Coldplay palette, like the compressed electronics that set an uptight tone in “Hurts Like Heaven.” But you barely have to wait 30 seconds in that track before the arrival of a burst of classic Coldplay: Mr. Martin’s optimistic falsetto “oohs” and a big, warm swelling of guitar. “Up in Flames” has a boomy, mechanical beat, as well as a melody as tender as any the band has ever played.

To represent a fresh start, Coldplay wanted an “un-Googleable” title, according to Mr. Buckland, 34. “When you’re on your fifth album, you are going to be judged against all your previous work and expectations,” he said by phone from London. “In a small way this is us trying to break free of those expectations.”

Pressed about the title, Mr. Martin described a kind of mythical character signifying the wonder of artistic inspiration.

“Music comes from a place we don’t know,” he said. “It sort of comes through the fingers and toes. So we came up with the idea of, what if you had musical digits, like xylo toes.” He shook his head, irritated that he gave up the secret so easily.

And what about “Mylo”?

“It’s just a great name,” he said. “For anything.”

From the beginning, the members of Coldplay — besides Mr. Martin and Mr. Buckland, they are the bassist Guy Berryman and the drummer Will Champion, both 33 — have struggled to balance their roles as world-conquering musical populists and four nice blokes who just can’t believe their luck. They met as schoolmates in London in the mid-1990s, and found worldwide fame in 2000 with “Yellow,” a haunting love song that showed the young band had absorbed the best commercial instincts of U2 and Radiohead.

In those days Mr. Martin was too shy onstage to venture very far from his piano, but he soon obtained the ancient knowledge of the great order of rock ’n’ roll showmen.

“I’m still learning it, but I have such great teachers: Mick Jagger, Bruce Springsteen, Bono Vox,” he said. “The key thing I learned from them is to just go be yourself, no matter how ridiculous it looks. It makes the concert so much more fun when you flip that switch and say: ‘I don’t care how I look. This is just what I feel like doing.’ ”

The lunch meeting was a follow-up that Mr. Martin had arranged a day earlier, before another interview — at a TriBeCa hotel — had even begun. Fully engaged in the promotional cycle, he was eager to satisfy the access needs for “print media,” he said as he shook a reporter’s hand.

On both days Mr. Martin wore a pair of black and fire-engine-red sneakers, with pristine red laces and an oversize tongue flap, like a futuristic version of classic b-boy high-tops. His friend Jay-Z had just asked him about the shoes, Mr. Martin said, but he didn’t have any information — they had been picked out by a stylist.

He and Ms. Paltrow married in 2003, and the tabloids chronicle their every step, whether walks with their two children — Apple, 7, and Moses, 5 — or double dates with Jay-Z and Beyoncé. (With a smile and a few well-practiced words, Mr. Martin deflected questions about his marriage.)

With his bandmates overshadowed, tension inevitably grew, and Mr. Martin has said in the past that he considered going solo. Lately he has said that “Mylo Xyloto” could be the band’s last album. But he quickly backpedals on that question, and Mr. Buckland did not seem very concerned about Coldplay’s mortality either.

“We don’t think of impending gardening, or anything like that,” the guitarist said.

More than any other major band, Coldplay has had to contend with a large and vocal hater contingent, who, among other things, have mocked Mr. Martin as perhaps the least macho man in rock. (He doesn’t help himself in that regard, as he explains the hardships of his “woman’s workout.”)

But nothing quiets naysayers like survival. Having outsold and outlasted most of their contemporaries, Coldplay has gradually accrued a certain respect. One indication: once-popular Facebook groups like “I hate Coldplay so much it makes me want to cry” seem to have petered out.

“We are very grateful for our job,” Mr. Martin said. “Even in the time we’ve been around, half the bands we’ve seen come, we’ve seen go — even people who were massive on our first album. So the longer time goes by the more we’re like, ‘It’s amazing that we’re still together.’ ”

In the music business, there are a few things that can help sink any band, no matter how talented. One is not “playing the game” of making the promotional rounds at radio and television, a hustle that tends to grease all the important wheels.

This has never been Coldplay’s problem.

“A lot of artists who have sold a lot less aren’t willing to do the things Coldplay will still do,” Mr. Weatherly said. “It has to do with their work ethic and their commitment to their art.”

At Coldplay’s level, some of that hustling doesn’t sound so bad. On Oct. 26, American Express is sponsoring a live broadcast of a concert from Madrid on YouTube and Vevo, directed by Anton Corbijn, the filmmaker and photographer known for his work with U2.

All of that gives Coldplay an edge in the market, and the album’s first two singles, “Paradise” and “Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall,” have already sold almost a million downloads.

The band seems likely to top the charts once again, but with all the numbers in the music industry diminished — the only unqualified blockbuster this year is Adele’s “21” (XL/Columbia), a dark horse in a world of Lady Gaga and Beyoncé — it’s no longer clear what a hit is. Industry estimates for the opening-week sales of “Mylo Xyloto” are in the 400,000 to 500,000 range — lower than the 700,000-plus the band has had for its last two records, but still enough for one of the biggest debuts of the year.

For Mr. Martin, the album is already a success. Thinking about the arduous process of recording, he cited a reward that plenty of bands dream of but few achieve.

“It’s challenging,” he said, “but only because you know the reward will be a field of people in Mexico singing along with you, which is such an adrenaline rush that it’s worth all the hours of, ‘Oh my God, this doesn’t work.’ If you get that bit, that the whole is bigger than its parts, then that’s your ticket all around the world.”

October 2011: Your One-Stop-Shop for Coldplay Info! [thanks ApproximatelyInfinite]

Q Magazine are the next of the reputable sources to review Coldplay's forthcoming album, Mylo Xyloto. It is the biggest and most in depth review found so far, but there is no rating to it - instead they have given a short paragraph to each of the songs with a promise of a complete review in issue Q305, out on 25th October. You can read more discussion on this new review at the Coldplay forum forum now. We'll try and cram in as many media review of the album before it drops...whenever. Read on for the Spin review... [thanks Jason-DeBord & Saketblitz]

Mylo Xyloto

The title track of Coldplay's fourth album is the 40-second soundscape piece that the band began their Glastonbury headline slot with - not to be confused with the Back To The Future theme tune that blared out as they walked on. The instrumentation is pure Eno, the producer's imprint all over the cascading glockenspiels and washed-out guitar lines as the song bleeds into Hurts Like Heaven.

Hurts Like Heaven

The first track proper sets the tone for the rest of Mylo Xyloto, bursting in with an up'n'at'em urgency. The melodies, like the title, are a nod to the '80s heroes they so successfully channeled on A Rush Of Blood To The Head, the Cure and Echo And The Bunnymen's influence looming large as Chris Martin sings like he's in a hurry; "I'm strangled with the feeling that my life isn't mine" sings the most brilliantly neurotic man in music, Jonny Buckland's guitars still set to the cosmic sparkle sound of the opener. The chorus - "you use your heart as a weapon/And it hurts like heaven" - is as upliftingly bittersweet as Robert Smith & co.'s best pop songs, whilst the "whoa oh oh" bridge provides the record's first stadium-singalong moment.

Paradise

The second single to be released from the album sounds much better in the context of the record - a mid-tempo bridge between the relative surge of Hurts Like Heaven and Charlie Brown. And, if the fuzzy stomp of those hip hop synths jarred with your impression of Coldplay(well, they wouldn't work on Yellow, would they?), then they make perfect sense on Mylo Xyloto as a whole, revisited on the first thirty seconds of Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall and punctuating the Rihanna-assisted hollers of Princess Of China.

Charlie Brown

The standout from their headline summer slots sounds even monumental on record; Charlie Brown is one of the best things Coldplay have done. Jonny Buckland's hypnotic guitar lines lead the way, the band channeling Joshua Tree-era, the heady holler-alongs of Arcade Fire and a teeny bit of Sigur Ros stargazing as the song launches into its adrenaline-veined climax. Whilst the music is wonderfully overblown, Chris Martin keeps the vocals cool and calculated, singing of "taking the car downtown to where the lost boys meet", which might be about nipping to Spar on Hampstead High St But probably isn't

Us Against The World

Forever destined to be known as The One They Fucked Up At Glasto, Us Against The World begins with delayed patterns of guitar and a lone church organ, before stripping back to just Chris Martin and his acoustic. Its approach sums up what makes Mylo Xyloto ticks; its production is far from stripped-down, but, unlike the bloated X&Y and the do-you-know-what-it-is-yet-cos-we-don't mishmash of Viva La Vida, everything here is a servant to the melody. And, five tracks in, the melodies are some of their best; here, Chris Martin whispers "slow it down" as an orchestral swell builds around him. Just when you think it's going to embark on a Fix You-esque outro, it finishes, perfectly.

M.M.I.X

Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall is deigned to be a sufficient enough centre-piece of the album that it warrants its own intro - so, M.M.I.X, a sort of sister to the opening track, is a minute-long electronica drone. It's almost as if Brian Eno had something to do with this record or something.

Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall

Much like the best songs on Mylo Xyloto, Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall is dominated by Jonny Buckland's intricate, epic guitars - Buckland takes a starring role on their fifth album. It's his playing that seems to summon the best from his colleagues - Martin has rarely sung better than he does when Every Teardrop... cascades into its hug-yer-mate outro, Guy Berryman and Will Champion now resembling a rhythm section driving the songs rather than filling in the gaps.

Major Minus

Beginning with the jagged strum of a detuned acoustic guitar, Major Minus sounds like the bitter flipside of God Put A Smile On Your Face. Chris Martin's vocals sounding like they were recorded in a seedy phonebox, the "they got one eye on the road/And one on you" chorus delivered amidst guitar shards and a kinetic percussive groove. One of the most immediate songs on the album, and the most darkly playful thing they've done since Daylight.

U.F.O

Harking back to the title track of their debut album, U.F.O is a melancholic interlude, Chris Martin's acoustic plucks joined by the swirl of strings halfway through, resembling a more saccharine take on Radiohead's Faust Arp. The escapism-themed lyrics ("let's fly/split the sky...") explain the title, just in case you were wondering if Chris Martin was about to grow a bed and start picketing outside Area 51 with Robbie Williams.

Princess Of China

It would've been ridiculous to suggest in the giddy two-hour heyday of stool-rock that its latest pretenders would belining up the biggest r'n'b star on the planet for a duet on their record - but Coldplay are a long way from 2001, accordingly, Rihanna's appearance on Princess Of China doesn't jar like it would if she popped up on the chorus of Don't Panic. They make her feel at home; Princess Of China is decorated with r'n'b flourishes from the syncopated march of the drums to the bulldozing synths. Jonny Buckland's guitar takes a backseat - well, it's Rihanna, you would wouldn't you? - but this offers a tantalizing glimpse of where Coldplay could go next.

Up In Flames

Beginning with a reverbed, Massive Attack-esque drum sample before a plaintive piano motif and Chris Martin's hand-on-heart vocals, Up In Flames puts Coldplay back in well-traversed ballad territory. The chorus - Martin repeating the title over and over in an echo-chamber falsetto - suggests that the days of autopilot Coldplay are over, beautifully simple and using the melody as its dynamic. Again, just when you think it might take off, it ends. Coldplay have learned to make their point a little more succinctly. Stunning.

A Hopeful Transmission

The third interlude of the album veers from the electronic thrum of Mylo Xyloto and M.X.I.X, instead opting for a lush string coda, underpinned by what sounds like, umm, someone playing the spoons in the background.

Don't Let It Break Your Heart

A sister-track to Every Teardrop... in the way its driven by stop-start rhythm of the drums and the way Martin forms an indelible hook out of the wall of sound sonic avalanches around him, Don't Let It Break Your Heart is one of Mylo Xyloto's most straightforward songs, a precursor, ala A Rush Of Blood's A Whisper, before a final bombastic blow-out?

Up With The Birds

Well, not really no, because final song Up With The Birds avoids the clichéd overblown ending, its brilliance, like much of Mylo Xyloto, hidden within the places the songs don't go. "The birds, they sang at break of day/Start again, I hear them say" sings Chris Martin over stark piano chords at the beginning, before an almost overwhelming burst of strings come to the fore. Then, the whole thing stops and starts again, before strummed acoustic guitars and gentle, almost lackadaisically-played drums usher the album to a peaceful, calming close.

Previously unpublished photos of Coldplay promo photos at iHeartRadio Music Festival, MGM Grand, Las Vegas (23rd September 2011):

Spin Magazine are one of the first reputable sources (we're not including NME in that) to review Coldplay's forthcoming album. Although they don't go into great depth and don't say whether they've heard the album in full (or whether they went to the Parlophone playback event in London last week which we wrote about), they do give the album a 7/10. Compare this (or not) to the 9/10 they gave Viva la Vida three years ago. You can read more discussion on this new review at the Coldplay forum forum now. We'll try and cram in as many media review of the album before it drops...whenever. Read on for the Spin review...

It says something about Coldplay's Top 40 assimilation that the most Rihanna-ish song on Mylo Xyloto isn't the one that actually features Rihanna. "Life goes on, it gets so heavy," Chris Martin sings over a booming hip-hop beat on "Paradise," and by the time he mimics RiRi's stuttered delivery on the hook, you're already picturing him sharing the space under his umbrella...

Like 2008's horizon-broadening Viva La Vida, Mylo Xyloto draws from an expansive palette that makes Coldplay's first three albums sound even quainter: "Hurts Like Heaven" rides a zippy new-wave groove that justifies its Cure-conjuring title, while the future-soul "Up in Flames" is basically James Blake writ very, very large; those supersaturated rave synths from first single "Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall" turn up again on the sparkling, real-Rihanna-assisted "Princess of China."

But where Viva La Vida showcased Coldplay's sense of adventure, this one feels more eager to please; the sonic detail accrues with such speed that it's like Martin and his mates fear you'll bail if they don't grab you straightaway. ("Slow it down," the frontman advises in "Us Against the World," right before piling on layers of dramatic church organ.) Of course, that's the implicit threat under which 
great pop songs live, and, for better or worse, Coldplay always rise
to that challenge.

New photos of Coldplay @ Rock In Rio festival, Rio De Janeiro, Brazil (1st October 2011):

More photos available via Rock In Rio @ Flickr now.

Before Coldplay's final festival performance of the summer at Rock In Rio, Chris and Jonny did a round of interviews which were recorded for radio. During one presented by TheMusicPimp, they talked about working with Rihanna, their 'transition to pop' as the interviewer put it, as well as Brian Eno, spraying walls, and more on the concept of Mylo Xyloto. You can listen to and download the full audio interview at the multimedia forum via SoundCloud now. Below is the article as transcripted. Most of the boring bits like the ID introductions have been taken out. [thanks jeremyy]

Chris referred to the album as "Mylo". "We really believe in the album as a format, because it's so hard to get people to listen to whole albums now. But we thought, 'who cares', Let's just try and make a really complete album, which has a journey from the start to the finish. If you want to find a story through it you can, and if you don't, then you don't have to. It's like a half-concept album."

When asked about what the journey was about for this album, Chris said: "Every album is like a diary entry really, as much as you try and disguise it with characters and themes and concepts, it's really just about how you're feeling about the world. I would say this one [Mylo Xyloto] has a bit more optimism than before [Viva la Vida] and more of an idea of togetherness, tackling the issues in life with the people you love. That's kind of the theme." Jonny added: "[On this record] we were more free to try anything, more free to try and express feelings of happiness."

Chris said: "We have nothing to lose now, we're really an old band. So we thought fuck it, let's just try anything we like. That reflects in the way we play [the songs], one of the important things for a band to do as they carry on is really rely upon the chemistry of everybody and not just rely upon the singer or just the guitarist. Everybody has to make their contribution."

"Mylo Xyloto can be anything you want it to be. When you look at graffiti artists, nobody uses their real name, using a new name to express their real feelings. So we came up with that name as an alter-ego for the band. It doesn't really make any sense, I know."

"There's two ideas for characters on the record which is a boy and a girl in a big urban environment, which is scary and oppressive. It's two souls trying to meet and get through life together. It's a very simple idea. Maybe because we spend so much time travelling from city to city, there can be a loneliness about travelling, so maybe there's bits of that coming through."

Regaring similarities on the Latin American influence of Viva la Vida: "Always in the middle of recording now, we try and put a tour of Latin America in. We've done it twice before on the last two records, half way through recording coming to Brazil and Argentina, Mexico etc." Jonny added: "This album completely changed direction because of that [last] tour. We were going very acoustic and quite small at first and then that tour changed our mind about what we wanted to do."

When asked how the audiences are responding to the new songs at the festivals, Chris commented: "We don't have a favourite song [from this era]. We thing they are all awesome and all terrible. Most of the audience leave. I don't know, it's hard for me to tell. When you're on stage you can't really tell what anyone is thinking. It's hard to know whether people are happy or angry! But as long as they're there you can't be doing too much wrong." Jonny adds: "We once played a gig in Barcelona where we thought everyone was having an amazing time; they were shouting at us and cheering. And then at the end of the concert the promoter came up to us and said that you need to apologise - half of the speakers weren't working and nobody could hear what you were doing! Everyone was shouting, 'We can't hear, we can't hear!'"

"[brian Eno] He's a mystery man. If you know Lord Of The Rings and Harry Potter, in both of those books there is a wizard who in both stories appear and do some magic, and then disappear. And then appear again, do something crazy and disappear again. That's just how Brian Eno is, when you're working with him. You don't really know what he's talking about, but he just makes magic and leaves you to try and make sense of it. Like a professor or a teacher. He makes it very fun in the studio - he brings a lot of freshness and excitement. When we first met him to work with him we were feeling a little depressed about what we do and where we're going as a group. Brian just removed all of those worries and made us enjoy just playing in a circle together. He plays in the circle also with his keyboards, and starts in a very simple level. That's his favourite thing to do - just play and play."

Inspiration for Us Against The World came from a friend of Chris going through a difficult time with drugs. He said: "It's a song about friendship and trying to help somebody through something." On working with Rihanna, Chris told them: "That was terrible. She's awful. No, this was the kind of thing we learnt from Brian Eno, in that if you love someone's work.. we would never have asked Rihanna to work on an album with us because it's like two different worlds, but this song arrived one day from wherever songs come from, and I thought 'That would sound really great if Rihanna sang it. But I didn't think it was possible. But then we were talking about it as a band as we were working on the track for a while, and I was singing both the boy part and the girl part, and it just didn't sound good enough, when I was trying to sing like Rihanna. So eventually we lost our fear and met her in Las Vegas at a New Year's show and asked her in the same way you'd ask a girl to dance when you're 17. I was nervous. She said, 'Okay,' and that's how it happened, and we're very grateful."

I don't know why. Part of us thinks that everyday someone will tap you on the shoulder and say 'Okay, the joke is over, we fooled you for all those years when you thought you were a famous band.' Because no-one really believes that they're great. We try our hardest to make things that we think people will respond to, and things that are honest about human emotions, that's probably why we have a lot of people who hate what we do, because sometimes what we're singing about doesn't resonate with what they're thinking. But we made a decision in 1999 to never try and be cool ahead of trying to be honest. Which means we've never been the coolest band in the world but we do sing like how we truly think. We're not pretending. It's hard, because it's very easy to attack that kind of music as well, so sometimes it's tempting to really bury your emotions and make clever music."

When Chris and Jonny were asked about their 'transition to pop', they responded: "We're just making what we want to make. We were making what we wanted to make back in 1999, and we're doing the same thing now. Yellow is probably our most pop song, and that's on our first record. Maybe. We don't want to keep making the same record, so some people like one record, some people like another record. It's a bummer if someone doesn't like where you've gone but we're just trying to follow what we like. Our first priority is to make something that sounds cool. We don't worry about what genre it fits into."

On their 'beautiful relationship with art', as the interviewer put it, Chris said: "Especially now with the internet, visuals and music are so permanently connected and we also just disovered making paintings and spraycans and just expressing ourselves a bit with colours and paints, as well as with music. We're not very good artists, but we get a good release when you've been recording and you just go and spray a wall or paint over a great picture (as we did on our last album). So they're all wrapped up in the same 'creative day.'"

New photos of Coldplay @ Rock In Rio festival, Rio De Janeiro, Brazil (1st October 2011):

More photos available via Rock In Rio @ Flickr now.

A few interesting storylines have popped up online following the publication of the Coldplay article as featured in the 25th anniversary edition of Q Magazine earlier in the week. As a result of the Q&A session with Chris, Guy, Jonny and Will, so far we've seen headlines on Chris's envy of Lady Gaga, Adele and Jay-Z, his wish for anything but an ordinary funeral and crying when Amy Winehouse comes on. The Q article seems to be very tongue in cheek, but boy do the media take the contents seriously. Here's a round-up of the stories making the headlines...

Popdash and DigitalSpy went with the headline "Coldplay's Chris Martin Reveals Lady Gaga, Jay-Z Envy". They wrote pretty much the same: "Coldplay's Chris Martin has claimed that he is envious of stars such as Lady Gaga and Jay-Z who can write universal pop songs. Martin, whose band will release their new album 'Mylo Xyloto' in October, made the comments in the latest issue of Q. Discussing his fellow A-list songwriters, Martin stated that hearing the work of others inspires him to make his own work good enough to compete. "When I hear Kings of Leon's 'Use Somebody' or Adele's 'Someone Like You' or Lady GaGa's 'Bad Romance', it's like, 'F*ck, that's good, I've got to try and do something better than that'. he said. Even close friends are not safe from Martin's green eyes, as he says about Jay-Z, "It's constant competition but born out of love. Or Jay-Z's 'Empire State Of Mind'. Jay revealed that when he was playing stadiums with us. Why would you do that to us? Why would you open a gig and then play a song that's better than any of our songs, you f*cking b*tard? Why would you do that to someone you claim to be friends with?" Conceding: "But then it also drives you to write better songs."

Meanwhile, Viagogo preferred to concentrate on Chris Martin jokingly wishing for a tribute funeral, writing the headline "Coldplay frontman: I want a tribute concert when I die", saying: "Chris Martin has said he wants a concert to be played in tribute to him when he dies and it is possible such an event could draw a large crowd, since Coldplay tickets sold out in minutes for the band's forthcoming tour. The singer spoke about the subject in an interview with Q Magazine, joking that he did not want a traditional funeral. "All I want when I die is a simple tribute concert at Wembley Stadium. That's all I ask. And maybe a covers album," he stated. People attending a Coldplay live show this December may have a rare chance to see the frontman display emotion, as the 35-year-old claimed he has learned to suppress his feelings "except on record". However, Martin admitted that he cried when listening to the Amy Winehouse song Back to Black after the pop star died.

However, FansShare ran with the Amy Winehouse story, with an article entitled "Chris Martin of Coldplay cried over Amy Winehouse", saying: "Chris Martin, the Coldplay frontman spoke to Q Magazine recently and joked about his morbid desire for a funeral concert when he kicks the bucket and how he couldn’t help but cry when listening to Amy Winehouse following her death. Chris Martin talked candidly about emotions and how he struggles to show any, but couldn’t help crying while listening to Amy Winehouses ‘Back to Black’ album following her death, he said "The last song to make me cry would be 'Back to Black' because she[Amy Winehouse] died, but that record moves me anyway” he then went onto talk more about how he struggles with showing his emotions saying “I'm 35. I don't cry any more, I just tense my muscles and grit my teeth. I'm getting progressively more English, managing to learn how to suppress all my feelings, except on record."

This just in from Sky News Australia - "Chris Martin recalls 'life of crime'" - Coldplay frontman Chris Martin says his 'life of crime' ended during his childhood when his cousin got caught shoplifting. The Coldplay frontman grew up in the UK and had a happy childhood. That didn't mean he never experimented though, as he was keen to test the boundaries. He can vividly recall trying to steal from a store with his cousin when he was younger. 'My brother and I both shoplifted once and felt bad about it. Mine was pick'n'mix (sweets),' he explained. 'I did it with my cousin but he tried to upgrade to a Mars Bar and got caught. The guy that caught him was fking terrifying so that scared me off. That was the end of my life of crime.' Martin chatted about the memory as he was thinking of the first album he ever bought. It made him recall the first record his brother really cared about, and the lengths he went to in order to get the artwork for it. '(The first record I bought was) possibly Hunting High and Low by A-ha,' Chris told Q magazine. 'My brother stole the cover of the Skid Row album from HMV because he had a recording of it on tape.' Martin also says he often feels like an 'idiot' at home because he is the only one in his family who doesn't speak Spanish. Actress wife Gwyneth Paltrow is fluent and their two children, Apple, seven, and Moses, five have been learning Spanish. He tells Spain's El Mundo newspaper, 'In my house, everyone speaks Spanish because Moses' nanny is Spanish. So I'm the only idiot who doesn't understand anything.'

Full discussion on the Coldplay article as featured in the 25th anniversary edition of Q Magazine at the Coldplay forum now and you can read the huge scans of the full article at the Gallery also [thanks Mimixxx, LoversInJapan & comicforce]

Coldplay have appeared in the Italian music magazine La Repubblica XL this week in an extensive interview about the new album Mylo Xyloto (including the first major review of this era). There were also some interesting pictures from within The Bakery/Beehive... including Coldplay's loo. Back to the album review - XL have given it a favourable 8/10 and compared it to Arcade Fire's Funeral. The closing line of the review entices: MX might very well be a bomb of an album, maybe you just need to give it some time to make your heart beat."

There is also a short video introduction from Chris and Jonny which you can watch here at the Coldplay forum (and also discuss the article, review, interview and pictures). [Many thanks to Patrizio at Coldplayzone, Saketblitz, iriden for the translation, scans and links!]

Interview article:

Coldplay are pissing in front of John Lennon. Seating of WC, they are looking at The Beatles in Hamburg. But it's not lack of respect - it's because in Bakery's bathroom [...] they hanged two pics on the wall: the first shows Lennon in the '70s with an Elvis Presley pin; the second one The Beatles in Germany in 1960, before Ringo Starr came in the band, when they were not-so-well-known...

'Can I go to the toilet?', asks Guy Berryman, Coldplay bassist, the coolest of the band, a beautiful browned hair guy. He's a thing about marathon and he's used to run and run with Chris. Strange: Guy looks dangerously like Joseph Fiennes who fell in love with Gwyneth Paltrow in Shakespeare In Love. And Gwyneth is the Hollywood star, married with Chris. It could be so nice to ask Guy if he had had a casting for that movie and about resemblance...

I'm not here talking about movies, but on the new album, Mylo Xyloto (the first ask 'What the fucking hell it means?' will win a peluche-Mylo Xyloto), out on October, 25th (in Italy that's the release date), anticipated by the two singles ETIAW and Paradise. [...]

I see Berryman vanishing in another room so I go upstairs in the Bakery. On the walls graffitis are all over. They reminds me the new album atmosphere and ETIAW video. Will comes to me - he's the factotum in the band, called 'the decisionist' of the gang. Anyway, my interview is planned with Chris and Jonny. So, look at there: they are sitting on a table, seeing a picture of a young Elvis Presley wearing a a cowboy hat, between his mum Gladys and his father Vernon. 'That's right, we are Elvis fans, of course'! Sounds weird: Coldplay are intrugued with rock history, they feel respect for the past but at the same time with Eno they are loking for a future outside rock music for their songs. That's the reason of Princess Of China - a duet with r'n'b' queen, Rihanna.

Let's start with the title (yes, we want to talk about it too!) Chris, what's Mylo Xyloto? Which language is come from? It seems ancient greek but...

It's very very modern english! It has to be pronounced [Mylo Ksailotou]. Two words invented by us, as the band name. Coldplay doesn't mean anything. Or, wait a minute... It's not true we're not meaning anything: it's 'cause Coldplay didn't exist as a word in the dictionary but from 1998 on it identifies us. And, as Mylo Xyloto, is a word you can't find googling in the web. So, you cannot trust in Internet to know what it means. We wanted a fresh, original, unknown word, linked only to us and no more. [A word] like Yaho, Google and iTunes: mysterious and different from all the stuff you could find surfing on the web...

Chris, in ETIAW you sing: 'I turn the music up/I shut the world outside'. It's a teenager stuff, isn't?

Not only that. It's usual for us to escape from reality through music. We do it. Before MX studio sessions, for two entire years every morning I ran and ran and, in the meanwhile, I have listened a different album every day. I was back to be a music fan: I forgot how was wonderful listening to our colleagues music.

Talking about Charlie Brown, if you can listen to it you realize you like Arcade Fire a lot.

Yes, we are not scared to confess. This love for them has to be pulled out somewhere and in some ways. It's really important for us to keep our fascination for the other bands alive, without feeling envy. Competition is ok, but you have to recognize the other bands value. After our Grammy, Radiohead sent us a letter with all their congrats

MX is yout fifth album but, sorry for that, i'm still not aware about a thing: Buckland is or is not a great guitarist? Chris, what do you think 'bout it?

He's not very highly thought of, because he doesn't show off technique. But I think 'guitar gods' (whom usually play so long solo riffs) are ridiculous. Jonny is great because writes fantastic melodies. I love him. Yes, Matt Bellamy is a bright musicist and Jonny Greenwood is very good, but in my opinion Jony is still the number 1.

And you, Buckland, what's your response?

My favourite riff is in Neil Youg's Cinnamon Girl, 1969: a single note, that's all

Is it true that MX was influenced by George Orwell's 1984 and Cormac McCarthy's The Road?

Yes, the concept of this album is the story of two people oppressed by the world they're living in. They meet each other, they fall in love and try to run away together. Paradise talks about a girl who's feeling lost, Charlie Brown is the male character running away with her. It starts like a bad moment but it has a peaceful and sweet end.

Like ETIAW, a song dominated by a euphoric rhythm, with some end of 80's house elements. Did you get mixep up with? Did you go in Spain during summer to dance, like thousand of english people?

Who? Us? Nope, we attended our middle schools in that period! We went in Spain on holidays, but along with our parents. They forced to go to bed at 10pm. Never seen a disco...

So, where did you heard Ritmo de la noche that's the background of ETIAW?

In a movie called Biutiful, directed by Inarritu, starring Javier Bardem. There was a scene in a club and someone played Ritmo de la noche, even if the original rendition was by Peter Allen, a 70's singer.

It's a perfect dance song. Why did you let Swedish House Mafia to remix it?

Initially, we asked this to the Sicilian Mafia but they were not so interested into. Can we joke with the Sicilian Mafia, right? We love Sicily. Do you think someone won't take it easy?

No, I don't think so, but it's much better going on with this interview. Let's talk about MX artwork. I see you have dozen of books about graffitis from every part of the world and the artwork itself was drawn by you and your friend Paris, a writer from Bristol. Why?

It's freedom of a total expression. We paint - or, at least, we making a scene with spray cans. We thought about a very cool graphic project, but in a second moment MX's music forced us towards experimentations. We are on the scene since more than 10 years, so sometimes we feel ourselves force to go as far as we do. Everyone has an opinion about us and on the web there's too much negativity. So we stopped us and said: let's invent a new our own private world, with our colours and our street art. As in a gang: to distinguish ourselves and to be not so scared of.

Are you scared about something? Why: you sold millions of copies and Viva La Vida... was the best selling album of 2008! Chris, are you afraid about what?

Nothing indeed! But when a band becomes big and important - and we were for a while (What? Is he humble now?), you appeals to too much people and not everybody spend such good words about you. It's for this reason we have never googled our name.

With some strange lyrics as 'I'd Rather be a comma than a full stop', you were asking for it!

... my relatives firstly! My uncle wrote me a letter and said that part of ETIAW is terrifying! But in my opinion is a good thing: at least i'm not dead. There's a comma, and something will happen tomorrow.

Let's criticise yourself by our own now. Why in your latest gigs you tributed Amy Winehouse singing Rehab, with that macabre verse like 'They tried to make me go to rehab and I said no, no, no'?

Because we have had some gigs during the same week Amy was found dead. And it is a great song indeed! Even Apple and Moses are used to sing it. And they also know every Katy Perry lyrics telling 'bout Roipnol and other pills. They also repeat a verse from Lil Wayne's Lollipop: 'She said lick like a lollipop'. It's just pop music, nothing to be worried about.

Mylo Xyloto album review:

The concept is as old as the world. A boy and a girl loving each other. But Chris Martin goes wild...

"‎'A boy meets girl, fall in love, struggling to stay together, and the prudent old history of the world seems to be the concept behind the meaning of Mylo Xyloto. (Read the interview on page 40, the fifth album by Coldplay, the sequel Viva La Vida ...best-selling album in the world in 2008.) Concept, yes, but, unfortunately, does not always mean entirely progressive, although MX is a great progression from the previous discs. Here I present to you my analysis of the album, after having approached the triumphant rock of Arcade Fire, the experience of hearing bands like Vampire Weekend (similar to Major Minus) and the eternal Talking Heads, I am able to account how successful MX may or may not be – after all, U2 steamed away from the production by Brian Eno after a while, maybe for the best, maybe not. The evidence lies within Coldplay’s newest set of songs.

I find the inspiration Coldplay uses, arrives from unexpected places, like the 90's dance, in fact- a sample of this Coldplay convey is in Every Teardrop ... thought to have hit the group's house Saccado. (‘El De La Noche Rhythm’ - those over 35 may know it well) stolen from the 70's pop singer Peter Allen. And even though Coldplay’s lyrics are in the opposite direction, (the lack of a purpose in life, drug addiction, which destroys the employment business, euphoric music, pure ecstasy) – Chris writes how things like how he compares adolescent eyes to the stars, with his fists in his pockets and claims indirectly how he is plainly not at all interested in whatever lyrics are supposedly popular to a certain market. Is this for the best, Coldplay? Almost every song we find on the album is written of alienation, with Every Teardrop being a hymn of salvation, and everything else MX turning out to be made of sadness and euphoria. So, saying this, Hurts like Heaven, we can imagine, is ETIAW’s younger sister. Arcade Fire’s melodies and dark color work without mystical treatment, and the same goes for U2 (Unforgettable Fire). We can see signs of this same aura in Charlie Brown. This is the hit that Arcade Fire could never write (and I bet this will be the next BIG single after 'Paradise'?). Finally, Us Against The World Turns out to be a bittersweet, romantic ballad that could we can not miss…for the world. MX might very well be a bomb of an album, maybe you just need to give it some time to make your heart beat.'"

(Rating: 8/10 - Suggested record to be compared with Mylo Xyloto: Arcade Fire - Funeral)

Just to compare, here all the ratings for other albums:

Apparat: The Devil's Walk 6.8

My Brightest Diamond: All things Will Unwind 7.4

Justice: Audio, Video Disco 7.3

Noel Gallagher: Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds 7.0

Zola Jesus: Conatus 8.0

Steven Wilson: Grace for Drowning 7.5

Peter Gabriel: New Blood 6.5

Evanescence: Evanescence 5.0

David Guetta: Nothing But The Beat 4.8

...A Toys Orchestra: Midnight ®evolution 7.0

Bedouin Soundclash: lIght The Horizon 7.8

Machine Head: Into The Locust 7.9

Tom Waits: Bad As Me 7.5

Scans and pictures from the La Repubblica XL (including photos from the Bakery/Beehive):

They are the biggest-selling band in British rock today but also one of the most criticised. Have the slings and arrows stopped us from getting to know the real Coldplay? The Sunday Times joined Coldplay in Japan to find out - and we now have the full transcript of the article entitled "They've Got A Ticket To Stride" below - which is also over at WikiColdplay in protected archive format. Enjoy!

If you are going to mess up a song - and I mean really balls it up to the point where you have to stop - you ideally wouldn't do it in front of 100,000 people, with another 16m watching the TV coverage. And God knows how many more on YouTube. You'd rather do it in the privacy of your own studio. Or bedroom. Or anywhere other than the pyramid stage at this year's Glastonbury, at the festival's climax, on a balmy summer's night.

It happened midway through Us Against The World, one of Coldplay's new songs, a ballad. The culprit was the band's genial, bearded giant of a drummer, Will Champion. He sang "rainbow" at the same time as Chris Martin, the frontman, sang the correct lyric, "raindrop". This caused a fit of nervous giggles that the pair tried to sing through. It didn't work. Marting called a halt. Then he saved the day. "I'm sorry," he grinned sheepishly, as the camera's zoomed in on him, "I fucked up."

Then he restarted the song, and Coldplay went on to play a triumphant set. This tells us two things about Chris Martin. One, he leads from the front. Two, perhaps he's not so much of an egomaniac as some people think he is. Champion would later confirm that Chris "took one for the team" at Glastonbury. "He's brilliant like that. He just papered over it, had a laugh and started again." The confession came after I was invited to hang out with Coldplay for a few days in Japan, where they were playing two very different gigs - to a huge crowd and to a select audience - to see the band's democratic dynamic at close hand.

Despite Martin's higher profile, and the fact that he writes almost all the lyrics, the four bandmates split their royalties equally. According to the latest Sunday Times Rich List, Martin and his film-star wife Gwyneth Paltrow's combined worth is estimated to be £48m. Coldplay's "other three", Jonny Buckland, Guy Berryman and Will Champion, are worth £32m each. Yet I can't help thinking the three have the better deal: they get the buzz and trappings of being in one of the world's biggest bands, and none of the personal scrutiny. Champion tells me that in "real life" he can just "wander around and do the shopping" undisturbed by public or paparazzi.

Martin, on the other hand, cannot. At times he has had an evasive, fractious relationship with journalists. In Japan things get off to a frustrating start in the hotel's gym and spa. Martin and Paltrow are notorious for their macrobiotic-yoghurt eating, yoga-tastic lifestyles. But I can't really criticise - I'm afraid I do yoga too. I've popped into the gym for a quick downward dogs only to find, when I stand up again, that Martin is executing the exact same moves a few feet away. Awkward. He looks lost in concentration, so I carry on for a bit, but when I next look up he has slipped away.

When we finally get to talk, we're at opposite ends of an enormous L-shaped sofa in the tour manager's hotel room. Jonny Buckland sits to the side like a referee. He is another 6ft-plus giant, with a ready smile and a penchant for army caps. He doesn't say much, whereas Martin has a spiky intensity about him. Martin is unfailingly polite and self-assured, but there is also a jittery knee-jerk defensiveness. He fixes me with piercing blue eyes and I can see his brain tick-tick-ticking away: what's my angle? Which way is this going to go?

Martin is highly aware that Coldplay divides opinion. Coldplay-haters scorn the band for being an all-pervasive musical monolith that relentlessly squats in the middle of the road. One poison-ped piece sneered they were the "gold standard of average" and the "sonic equivalent of wilted spinach". Martin gets flak for everything from his lyrics (too oblique) to his background (too middle class), his clean-living lifestyle (not rock'n'roll), his advocacy of good causes (too preachy), even the names of his two children with Paltrow (Apple, 7 and Moses, 5).

Today Martin sniffs: "I don't feel we have to behave a certain way to be considered cool by people I don't think are that cool anyway. Rock'n'Roll is freedom to be yourself. If you want to wear a thong and dance to Abba, that, to me, is rock'n'roll. I don't want to have to pretend to be from the '60s, or from Manchester, if I'm not. And if you happen to be unfortunate enough to be a well-spoken public schoolboy from Devon, tough luck. If you're pretending to be something different, it's bullshit."

He went to posh Sherbourne boarding school in Dorset. Coldplay's Scottish bassist, Guy Berryman, is also privately educated. The other two, guitarist Jonny Buckland, who was born in London but grew up in Wales, and drummer Will Champion, from Southampton, both went to state schools. Of course not everybody cares how middle-class Coldplay are and whether this has any bearing on their authenticity - a lot of people simply like their music. The band's first four albums of melodic soft-rock have sold 48m copies, which makes them Britain's biggest current band, outselling Muse, Radiohead, even housewives' choice Take That.

Coldplay release their fifth studio album next month, but Martin is reluctant at first to tell me what it's called. "Once we start saying it, we have to start defending it," he groans. "The same thing happened with my daughter's name (Apple)..." He trails off, then pouts: "But fuck 'em." Another pause. "It's going to be hard to do this without sounding pretentious..." Come on, then, Chris, let's have it. "Mylo Xyloto. And the next inevitable question is, what the fuck's that?" He's interviewing himself. Buckland leans over and pours more coffee.

"We wanted it to be called something that doesn't mean anything yet, giving the album a chance to be totally it's own thing," Martin continues. "The word 'Coldplay' has too many opinions attached to it by people who don't like the music. This is like a fresh start, there's no ramifications." Is it a response to all the slings and arrows? "No, God, no," he insists. "We've attracted flak, but we've also done really okay." He sounds a little hurt momentarily, then rallies with: "We're the 15th best selling rock band this year!"

Funny guy. But he doesn't allay my suspicion that it is a response to their critics, on some level. He says that certain reviews have inspired him "to improve my lyrics - and so I have". Then comes the revelation that Mylo Xyloto is "our version of a concept album", a love story. "It came from looking at the news, and thinking about young people and whether two people could meet and escape from a place like Afghanistan or somewhere where there's darkness swirling around them. It could be someone from an alcoholic family meeting someone from a warzone - two people with problems who find salvation in each other."

Mylo and Xyloto? "If you want to, you can use it as the name of one of the characters," he says. "It's a mystery, but we like that. We just invented two words that you couldn't even Google. We tried it and got no results." There are now - just under 1.9m hits at the time of writing.

When I later watch the band being interviewed for Japanese TV, there is something in the open, sunny charm they project that's surprisingly reminiscent of the Beatles. Not that I'm saying that Coldplay are the new fab four. I'll leave that to the rapper Kanye West, rarely given to understatement, who said: "In 30 years, people will look back and say, "Those guys were more talented than the Beatles."

He went on to compare Martin to John Lennon. "I don't believe he said that," Martin snaps. Oh yes he did. "He might have meant we are underappreciated while its all happening, but I don't think it was. 'Coldplay are better than the Beatles.'"

Others have also made the comparison. Noel Gallagher said: "I listen to [Coldplay's song] Violet Hill and it's like the Beatles. I just think Chris Martin is a great songwriter." (Though he did add that Liam "fucking hates them"). Paul McCartney himself had called Coldplay a "good little band" - the exact words he once used to describe his own.

In one of our Tokyo hotel's many bars, on the gazillionth floor, which looks out onto a nouveauriche skyline - all skyscrapers and shopping malls - Champion reveals that the four of them haven't always got along so well. "In the early days it was much more difficult because we were so ambitious. We had a lot more creative tensions than we do now. We thrash it out until it's resolved. In the past there would be an argument and a storm-out."

According to reports of one notorious flare-up, while recording their debut album, Parachutes, Martin repeatedly lashed out at Champion for being "shit" if he drummed out of time. Then, in a fit of remorse, Martin felt he "had to pay" for his behaviour by going out and getting drunk. He was apparently later found incoherent and dribbling purple vomit - the result of drinking beer, vodka and ribena. He decided adstinence was the way forward after that. "It was pretty grim at times," Champion recalls. "But we knew Coldplay couldn't survive any of the people not being in it."

"We've gone the opposite way to most bands," says the bassist Guy Berryman, 33, the shortest bandmate at 5ft 10in. "Usually, everyone starts off being really chummy and ends up falling out. Here, all our fights were at the beginning and now we get on really well." These days the challenge is to keep it fresh. "It's progressively harder and harder to do something different with our music," Berryman says, adding that to truly break the mould they'd need to "go away [from each other] for a good amount of time and then come back with an album that is radically different. If you just keep on going, the mystery is kind of lost".

Coldplay have been on the go - writing, recording and touring - for 12 years. In fact, their entire adult lives have been spent as either students or rock stars. The signed to the EMI subsidiary Parlophone in 1999 before they had finished their degrees at University College London, where they first met (Berryman is the only non-graduate - he dropped out to work as a barman). They released Parachutes in July 2000 - it won them the Brit for Best British Album and sold 9.5m copies. There were no wilderness years skint and in the slow lane: Coldplay went from nought to ubiquity.

"About a month is the longest we've ever been not doing anything," says Champion, who is also 33. "We don't want to feel like we've wasted opportunities while we're still relatively young. I think one's capacity to work super-hard is obviously limited, I supposed in the same way as football players: you have a window when you're at your best."

I sometimes feel perhaps we should stop touring and just go and live for a little while," says Berryman wistfully, though he doesn't offer any suggestion as to how they might benefit from an extended break, beyond "just to get some new ideas before we start recording again." Later, after watching the band perform, I'll mistake Berryman for one of the crew. He wastes no time in recounting my faux pas to the rest of the band. Chris Martin relishes the opportunity for a laugh at my expense. "Pleased to meet you, I'm Chris Martin," he gurgles each time we meet thereafter.

The bandwagon rumbles on. Later that evening, Coldplay play a gig for a few hundred Japanese fans at a TV studio for the NHK network. It's a useful warm up for their much bigger gig two days later at the Fuji Rock festival, Japan's equivalent to Glastonbury. They perform five new songs alongside hits such as Yellow and Fix You. It's quickly apparent that the new stuff doesn't deviate wildly from the old: it retains the swirling atmospheries of 2008's slightly more experimental album, Viva la Vida, but the new songs are more compact and direct. The instant familiarity of each underscores Coldplay's status as a band at the peak of its powers.

For this new album they teamed up again with eccentric producer Brian Eno, of Roxy Music fame, with whom they first worked on Viva la Vida. This time, Eno didn't produce - he was involved much earlier, co-writing songs, singing, playing keyboards and other instruments and acting as a "creative consultant". " His favourite thing to do is to just play in a circle. He comes in like a feeding cow with his udders full and you've got to milk him and let him go," Martin tells me.

"After the last record, he wrote to us and said, 'I think we can do better.' So we asked him to write us the ten commandments for how to make a great album. Some were abstract like, 'Cook like an Italian', meaning use simple ingredients, don't overcomplicate stuff. Or he'll say, 'Don't use every colour in every painting', or, 'You must be fishers of men, not too proud to use simple hooks'. It's arty-farty stuff, but it works."

Does he still want to change the world? Like Bono, Martin is notorious for his political beliefs. Coldplay have a relationship with Oxfam's Make Trade Fair campaign. Emily Eavis, daughter of the Glastonbury founder, Michael Eavis, introduced the band to the charity. Oxfam subsequently took Martin to Haiti and to Ghana, so he could witness extreme poverty first hand. Martin, barely in his mid-twenties, was hugely affected by what he saw. Soon after, he began scrawling an "equals" sign on his hand before performing in concert. He was also photographed with "Make Trade Fair" inked on his arm.

Some things in life are guaranteed to raise people's hackles: being a campaigning multimillionaire rock star, however well intentioned, is one. At 34, Martin is now able to acknowledge this. Sort of. "The word 'campaigning' makes me uncomfortable," he says. "At the time I was writing on my hand, we definately were campaigning. Now, we like to do it more subtly. You can see who we support at a concert or on our website, but we don't like to be so shove-it-down-your-throat-y."

So you admit that you were?

"Um. Not... Er. I don't really know. Maybe. I only know I want to scale it back. I'd rather it's like, if you want to know what we think, then you can find it, rather than, 'Here's what I think!"

We used our voice on Make Trade Fair, which we still believe in, but if we were to suddenly say...!"

"And now, the rainforests!" chortles Buckland. "Yeah!" Martin continues. "If we changed causes as often as we changed clothes, it would start to be a bit hollow. The list of things we care about gets longer as we get older, but it just wouldn't work to go: Make Trade Fair! Save the rainforests! Be carbon neutral! Er... listen to Radiohead!"

He is wearing a Radiohead t-shirt. "I'm a big fan. I'm friendly with a couple of Radiohead, but only by text. They've always been very sweet to us. It's nice that there's a camaraderie among bands, especially as there's not many left. Everyone wants to be better than everyone else, of course, but they're friendly about it."

Coldplay are still driven to want to be the best; they are obsessive about their craft. Even though they are on tour, and their days are filled with promotional engagements, they are also still tinkering with Mylo Xyloto, a process that began nearly two years ago, working Monday to Friday in their Hampstead recording studio, The Bakery, and the nearby studio and rehearsal space, The Beehive. For every song that ends up on the album, there are "probably 12 that were rejected", Martin says. As we talk he reveals that they still haven't decided which 10 songs to go with. They have narrowed it down to 16.

This may be a rock tour, but, as you may have gathered by now, there isn't much rock'n'roll excess. And when they're not working, they're at home being parents; the four bandmates all have young children, though Berryman has separated amicably from the mother of his.

Paltrow commented recently on the false rumours that her marriage to Martin was on the skids: "Sometimes it's hard being with someone for a long time. We all go through periods that aren't all rosy. If, God forbid, we were ever not going to be together, I respect his so much as the father of my children. Like, I made such a good choice. He's such a good dad. You can never be relaxed or smug." She went on to say a wife should keep herself on her toes. Whether Martin also keeps her on her toes, or vice versa, we can only guess at. He has walked out of an interview in the past when pressed on their relationship. She, in turn, is happy to make excuses for his refusal to speak about her, telling Elle magazine recently that he was "a musical genius. It's like living with Picasso. He makes music for his fans, and he doesn't want people to conjure a lame famous couple when they're getting into his music. I get it."

I tell Martin how much I enjoyed Paltrow's performance as a fading country-music superstar in the film Country Strong. Did she draw on his experience as a performer? "I think a bit of mine and a lot of other friends," he fidgets. I persevere. Which bits did she draw on? "Nothing specific. Look, you know I'm not comfortable discussing this." End of conversation. Though Paltrow is less uptight about it. Around the same time as Martin was giving me short shrift in Tokyo, the actress tweeted: "Who do I have to bang to get an advance copy of the new Coldplay album?"

Martin is more forthcoming about his unlikely friendship with the ghetto-fabulous rapper Jay-Z and his wife, Beyonce Knowles, whom he helped persuade to perform at Glastonbury this year (Beyonce was worried that her high-maintenance R&B would not be well received at the rock dominated mudfest). They met at a charity event in 2003; Jay-Z said: "We clicked right away and it was like we were instant best friends."

"When you're lucky enough to spend time with Jay, you just learn a lot from his calmness in dealing with a problem," Martin says. "That's what I really love about him: if there's a problem, you just fix it. He doesn't worry in a neurotic way."

Are you a worrier? "I'm a complete neurotic! But I think I'm learning to worry about what you can do rather than what you can't."

Do any of the band need to be reined away from the various temptations freely available to rock stars? Champion - Coldplay's most outgoing personality after Martin - says not. "Obviously, with the trappings of what we do, it's very easy to fall into those kind of behaviours," he admits. "Playing live, and a lot of stuff that surrounds being in a band, is super-real - it's hyper-real. It's very difficult to not come off stage and think, 'Well actually, what do I do now? How do I sustain that feeling? So it's easy to see why people chase it. But we get our fix from playing hundreds of concerts every year. We don't need that other stuff."

Not that they're saints. The morning after their TV performance and late-night recording session, Champion and Buckland ended up on the lash with members of the rock band Arctic Monkeys, who are staying in the same hotel. The pair have eyes the colour of house bricks. Fortunately, their make-up people have eyedrops to fix that. It is the day before Fuji Rock, and the band will spend the afternoon being interviewed in yet another vast hotel room by a procession of Japanese TV crews.

Martin, team leader, is usually first to reply. Despite the yoga, he remains a tightly wound ball of nervous energy. Whenever there is a pause, he'll turn the tables on the interviewer. Are Japanese paintbrushes made of bamboo, he asks, after the band is invited to try their hand at calligraphy (Berryman obliges). Do children here learn calligraphy in school? Next they are presented with traditional fans. Martin can't resist the obvious joke. "Hey! at least we have four fans in Japan!"

Coldplay have a relaxed chemistry on camera. The interviews last all afternoon; the band flags only at the end, messing up the words and getting the giggles. Inevitably, Martin takes control. "Right! Let's do that again!" he barks. Yet they never lapse into arrogance, never once giggle at their Japanese hosts' mispronunciation of "Coldpray". Things turn serious when, out of the blue, Martin is asked if he has a message for Japan in the wake of the recent earthquake and tsunami. "You want me to address the nation?" he asks, incredulously. No pressure. But he conjures a gracious reply, concluding: "If there's one place on Earth that can deal with this, it's Japan."

Next day, the band and a small entourage take the bullet train from Tokyo station to Naeba, home to Fuji Rock. It's a humid, grey, damp afternoon. There is little conversation; the four withdraw into their own private worlds, each wearing chunky headphones. Their two security guards constantly shepherd fans away from them as we wait on the platform. To preserve his singing voice, Martin, who keeps his hood up, doesn't speak - he communicates by writing notes on his iPad, which makes him seem oddly childlike. Or a bit special-needs. What's that, Chris? Oh, you want some water? Here you are, then...

While the other bands at Fuji Rock festival are crammed into tiny dressing rooms not much bigger than garden sheds, Coldplay has a mini-village. There is a dressing room, a "quiet" room, offices, a cramped practice room full of instruments. Not that this feels in any way glamourous. It's draughty, pouring with rain, and the roof leaks. "We're English," shrugs a crew member, "we're used to it."

There's less than two hours to showtime, but no time for slacking. Or boozing. Or lording it. Or getting scared. Or anything other than work, work, work. Once Coldplay have changed and eaten, there is another round of TV interviews, leaving only a few minutes for the briefest of jams in the practice room before being whisked to the side of the stage. A crowd of around 50,000 awaits. Ready for action, Chris? "More than ever," he says, as calmly as if he's just spent the past hour performing sun salutations. It's strange, this is by far the most relaxed I've seen him. "You can tell that from our collective weight - we've never weighed in so light. Fighting weight, that's what it feels like. But also, for anyone that likes you, you want to make them feel validated."

Backstage, adrenaline coursing through them, the band limber up wordlessly like athletes preparing for a race, and then it's time. They bound out to the theme tune from Back To The Future, Martin's favourite film, to huge roars.

it's a spectacular show. Martin whirls around the stage with his acoustic guitar, somehow managing not to trip over all the cables, before taking to his graffiti-covered piano. Buckland masterfully alternates between chunky guitar riffs and the addictive melodies that are Coldplay's trademark; Berryman's bass rhythms are immaculately funky; Champion thrashes his drums with the force of a rampant silverback.

Twice the teeter on Glastonbury-style howlers - first when Martin, either by mistake or because he feels like it, suddenly changes the running order of the songs. The audience are oblivious, but backstage there is pandemonium, as the crew frantically try to work out which instruments to bring on next (Buckland alone has an arsenal of 12 guitars). Then, during a lighting blackout between songs, a roadie rushes on to hand Martin a microphone but drops it. Martin springs across the stage to grab it and still finds time to mouth "it's okay" to the poor chap before whirling to face the crowd as the lights go up. Is Chris Martin an egomaniac? Not on this showing.

Coldplay's soaring, enveloping, palliative anthems are tailor-made for occasions like this. There are swathes of coloured light, laser beams, confetti explosions, popping fireworks, Japanese girls in the front row wave Union Jacks, a reminder to battered, cynical old Blighty that in Coldplay we have an export that is celebrated around the world. And we could do with more of that.

When Chris Martin hinted the last Coldplay album might just be exactly that – their last – producer Brian Eno had other ideas, writes MusicWeek, in an extensive article on Coldplay and their forthcoming album, Mylo Xyloto. Read on for the details... you can discuss this article at the Coldplay forum now [thanks Skuze23]

Guitarist Jonny Buckland explains: "Brian’s a very inspirational character. He wrote us a letter actually after we finished the last album saying, ‘That was good, but I think we can go further, we can do more’ and so, in a way, he got the ball rolling for this." Drummer Will Champion adds: "Chris always has a knack of saying that this could be our last album but at the time, after we’ve just finished an album, it genuinely does feel like there’s nothing left in the tank – there’s no more ideas, so the idea of recording another record is terrifying."

It is to Eno’s credit that he has eked more mileage from the Coldplay juggernaut as Mylo Xyloto, the band’s fifth studio album, is arguably their most exciting, best flowing and enthralling listen since 2002’s A Rush Of Blood To The Head. Threatening more potentially classic Coldplay hit singles than its predecessor, 2008’s Viva La Vida And Death To All His Friends, it is not only likely to confirm their position as the world’s biggest band but potentially better its 9 million worldwide sales. Chatting at their Bakery Studio in Hampstead – having just finalised the tracklisting over lunch - the band appear relaxed although admittedly nervous how the world will respond to a record which began life as a “quiet acoustic record”, at one point was intended to be a soundtrack to a Yellow Submarine-style animated film (abandoned because it would take five years to make) and now sees life as a progressive synth-infused pop “concept album” that still rocks; Buckland’s guitar is arguably more prominent than on previous outings...

Bassist Guy Berryman reveals: "It was going to be a kind of soundtrack album to a film we were writing which had a story through it and we got quite far down the line with designing characters and then we abandoned that idea and moved into a different direction, retaining elements of the acoustic album and the soundtrack album, so what we’ve ended up with is an album that we arrived at in quite an unusual sort of way. So it’s kind of a hotchpotch of all those different phases."

Frontman Chris Martin – who last week revealed to Music Week how the Rihanna collaboration on future single Princess Of China came about – does not baulk at the idea of describing Mylo Xyloto as a concept album; indeed against a climate of downloading individual tracks he says they deliberately set out to make a body of work which fans would want to listen to in its entirety. "I think if you wanted to use that word you wouldn’t be wrong," Martin says. "It’s about people who are lost in a big scary environment and find each other as a form of getting through it. It’s a love story basically. But it hasn’t got many dragons or mountains, which I think is what people associate concept albums with. We really felt like the album is so under threat as a format that we should really make an effort to really tie it all together. And even if they don’t want to own it all, it makes sense as one thing, should anyone be interested in that. So if you want to find a narrative through it you can, which is something that we just enjoyed doing."

Production was entrusted to their established team: Markus Dravs, Daniel Green, Rik Simpson and Eno who is credited with 'enoxification and additional composition' with former manager Phil Harvey – the band’s unofficial “fifth member” – in a crucial creative director role. Berryman adds: "There were elements that were the same but it feels like a completely different page."

Indeed, recording sessions have not just included time experimenting at The Bakery with Buckland noting: "We can spend weeks on end with Brian doing songs based on campanology or, you know, barber shop" – and their other nearby larger studio The Beehive. Instead they have worked on the album while on tour in Miami, New York, Los Angeles and Tokyo, where they completed the album just last month (see track by track). Champion adds: "It was crucial really because we could see that the deadline was getting closer and closer and those hours that we had in those studios around the world were really priceless."

Parlophone president Miles Leonard, the band’s A&R man, agrees the band have made a benchmark album. "This has been a long while in the making but the band came off a huge touring schedule straight into writing and playing around with songs and that’s where Brian comes in and deconstructs songs and rebuilds them again. Then someone like Markus comes in and takes charge and gets behind the desk and delivers that rock sound," he says.

Meticulous planning meetings between the record company and management for a minimum 18-month campaign – possibly taking the band to yet uncharted territories including South Africa, Eastern Europe, south-east Asia and China – have occurred weekly since February. Leonard stresses, despite having 50 million album sales under their belt, nothing with Coldplay is taken for granted. He is particularly complimentary about 3D Management’s attention to detail and approach to the two singles prior to the album release (see box) – and especially allowing the band to preview new material on tour during the summer including during their Glastonbury headline where they delivered U2 a masterclass in how to enthral a festival crowd. Leonard says: "We see it as an advantage, not a disadvantage, to have more music out there. Nowadays people need to hear more than one single to be convinced to purchase a record."

But, frankly, it is likely to be the album purchase of 2011 for which many will need least convincing..

POP APPROACH: THE ALBUM'S UNUSUAL SETUP

Against a backdrop of declining sales for rock bands, Coldplay manager Dave Holmes risked a “pop approach” to release two singles – Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall (June 3) and Paradise (September 12) – ahead of their new album on October 24 in an unusual setup. He explains: "When I know we have enough songs for the album, I start thinking about the ideal time for release and in this case I had a non-traditional approach which I thought about, taking a really long setup. We decided on a single out in June – no talking about the album during an 'around the world buzz gig tour' if you will – as they test-drive the new material. I said, 'Let’s just let the music do the talking.'"

"I wanted to be grass roots. I said to them, ‘You have to be out there wearing two hats as you tour and finish the record.’ But people these days have such a short attention span – I see rock acts put out one single and then one album and then it disappears and then in pop they take two singles... I suppose they have to persuade people to buy the album. But by taking that couple of songs approach you feel engaged, and there’s not a lot of that going on with rock records at the moment."

While Holmes – now entering his 11th year of managing the band – agrees that his sense of excitement around Mylo Xyloto is reminiscent of that prior to A Rush Of Blood To The Head, his ambition with the record is not just to sell more albums. "I do think this will do better than the last, I would like it to do better, but it’s not just about sales. It’s about having more songs which stand the test of time. It would be great to walk away from this campaign with more songs in their repertoire."

MYLO XYLOTO: Exclusive track-by-track rundown with Chris Martin

01 MYLO XYLOTO

It means whatever you want it to mean. [To me] it means a freedom of expression and you can think up new words if you want to. There’s still things that you can invent and words beginning with X are few and far between so we thought we might try and add one.

02 HURTS LIKE HEAVEN

That’s the opening track, really. That’s kind of our call to arms to each other. I think it’s calisthenics musically for us. It warms you up.

03 PARADISE

If we ever won The X Factor, that’s the song we might sing. We never will, of course, but that’s what we would do. I think, if truth be told, we’re not really handsome enough to go on it.

04 CHARLIE BROWN

This is the only song we ever wrote in a doll’s house. I was staying in a place with a Wendy House and I turned it into a studio ‘cos my daughter didn’t like it. And I came back from a Bruce Springsteen show in LA and I was like, ‘Okay, let’s see if anything came out of that day.’

05 US AGAINST THE WORLD

The whole thing is supposed to be a kind of story so they all fit together and that is the two characters from the previous two songs when they meet each other. It’s about meeting someone you love and feeling powerful, when you meet someone and suddenly everything feels alright again.

06 M.M.I.X.

It doesn’t stand for 2009. It came from (long-serving guitar tech) “Mat McGinn is awesome” so I don’t know why the fuck it got called that. It has nothing to do with anything… it stands for nothing; it’s just a collection of letters.

07 EVERY TEARDROP IS A WATERFALL

So the central theme of the record – Paradise is kind of about this as well – is trying to turn bad things into good things somehow. We as a band have been through some funny incidents in terms of people being aggressive towards us or whatever. And a lot of the record is fuelled by a kind of fire which comes from turning that negativity into positivity. And I think everyone in their life has something like that.

08 MAJOR MINUS

That’s like a Bond villain of a song. A bad cousin of the album. It’s the nasty one.

09 UFO

That’s the acoustic… that was the first song written for the album actually and the chord sequence in it pops up a few times. And that’s a kind of prayer “times” kind of song. There’s a lot of feeling lost on the album but also being found as well and that’s very much a bit of both.

10 PRINCESS OF CHINA (FEAT. RIHANNA)

I actually sort of wrote it for Rihanna and then I liked it too much. And then it became clear it was like a sort of back and forth between a couple. It took about a year to pluck up the courage but eventually I asked her and she was not unwilling. I played it for her on piano in Los Angeles. That was quite nerve-wracking, I’ve got to say. And so she said, ‘Oh okay, yeah!’

11 UP IN FLAMES

We wrote that about four weeks ago and then we recorded it in five countries in seven days. That was fun. That was when we knew we could finish the record because Will – who’s the hardest to please of the band – when he heard that he said, ‘Okay, we can finish now’ because I think he liked the space on it.

12 A HOPEFUL TRANSMISSION/DON’T LET IT BREAK YOUR HEART

Well, I think we wanted to do an album this time with a happy ending and I think we’ve actually done it, which we never thought we’d do. For whatever reason it is, it’s happened and that was very late in the day and it’s nice that song ‘cos you just hit everything as hard as possible – which for a band like Coldplay is a very pleasurable thing.

13 UP WITH THE BIRDS

That was when we were sort of thinking about a story that seemed like the end of a movie type thing.

More photos of Coldplay at Austin City Limits festival (16th September 2011):

Pictures: ACL Festival @ Flickr

Since we exclusively reported that Hype Williams was working with Coldplay's new video for Paradise, Williams's first with the band since the official Viva la Vida shoot back in 2008, MTV have all but confirmed the collaboration with an interview with Chris Martin during the Austin City Limits festival this past weekend. They also hint at a new face appearing in the video. Here's what they had to say:

Coldplay already told MTV News that they decided to roll the dice and go with the inscrutable title of Mylo Xyloto for their upcoming fifth album. But when the time came to make a video for their second release from the disc (due October 25), the beat-infected Paradise, they went all in and reteamed with a director best known for lensing clips for some of the biggest names in hip-hop and R&B (Kanye West, Mary J. Blige, Rick Ross). "We just started to do a video on Monday on 'Paradise,'" singer Chris Martin told MTV News at the Austin City Limits festival. "And the bits that we're not in are being done almost as we speak."

The new clip — whose concept Martin kept under wraps — is being directed by Hype Williams, who first worked with the band three years ago on the title track to their last album, Viva La Vida. That clip had the feel of a Renaissance painting, complete with cracked paint effects, and Martin said they decided to work with Williams again because, well, why not? "We're just following the things we love," he said. "The video we did before, for 'Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall,' we did with our friend Mat [Whitecross], who is the most indie of indie filmmakers. It's just nice when you can try both approaches."

Frontman Chris went on to explain: "Paradise is about a girl really, the female half of the album, just about being a bit lost in the world and escaping through fantasy." As for the promo for the song – which has been directed by Hype Williams - Chris admitted he prefers not to grace the screen for the band’s music videos, and would rather leave that up to "someone attractive and beautiful". He went on to hint the Paradise video "might have to have a girl in it," joking that "it might actually be pleasurable to watch!"

Between working with Williams, opting for a cryptic title and roping in a surprise cameo from Rihanna on the song "Princess of China," Martin explained that Coldplay are just rolling the dice because they've kind of earned the right. "We felt like so many people have already made up their minds about us ... both good and bad," Martin said. "That we can sort of start again from scratch and try and reflect all the music we listen to and love."

A recent R#42 blog photo showing Coldplay recording the Paradise video... but there will be more to it...

Chris Martin dropped by the Rolling Stone studio yesterday to chat about Coldplay's fifth album Mylo Xyloto, a record which reunites the band with Viva la Vida collaborators Markus Dravs and Brian Eno. This time around, though, Eno was less involved in production and more engaged in the actual performances. Below are some of the excerpts from the interview - in which Chris was unusually unassuming and candid. You can also watch and download at the Coldplay forum now [thanks Blue Nails & zzz]

On working with Brian Eno for the new album: "Brian Eno has become, not a session musician, but a player," says Chris. "He loves to just stand in the circle and play with the band. So he's kind of more of a band member than producer this time, which is very fun, because he comes up with very strange ideas and crazy noises, which quickly become irreplaceable. The key bits of advice that Brian has given us are really to do with self-confidence and not being afraid to really reflect what we love and what we listen to and not be concerned about where we might fit in the overall scheme of bands - and try and be a bit more fearless. As Englishmen - as as musicians 50 years into rock music - we can get a bit intimidated by all of our peers and people who have gone before us. But he {Brian] makes us forget about all that when we're in the studio which feels very liberating.

On the release of Mylo Xyloto, Chris talked about how it sounds and how it might 'fit': "I feel that now's the time more than ever to make albums, if that's our specialty is. We do that better than we do singles probably, and we still love listening to 45 minutes of one person at a time. Although we are well aware that it might be shooting ourself in the foot, we've tried to make a coherent piece that all links together from start to finish. A bit like making a great horse-and-cart just as automobiles were coming in... but that's ok! The sound of our record is un-clear to me at the moment. It's too early. Once you've handed it over you can't listen to it again because you just hear problems. So I remember a week or so ago when we finished it sounding quite 'colourful' - I don't know if they're good colours or bad colours but they're definately different colours in places."

Chris also spoke excitedly about the band's collaboration with Rihanna on the new song "Princess of China," noting that her contribution is the best singing on the record. He said: "We had this song called Princess Of China about two years ago, which we secretly wanted to offer to Rihanna to sing, but I really liked singing the first verse. Then the sweep of the album came together and this song really fit as a damaged love song and so after about six months of not feeling brave enough we got in contact with her and asked if she would sing on it. Fortunately for us she said yes. And it's by far and away the best bit of singing on the album!"

On the future, Chris said: "We have no plans at the moment, past Thursday. It's a day at a time; we can't take anything for granted any more, it doesn't matter if you used to be big or famous, you have to prove yourself all over again. We don't have any immediate touring plans, we just got to see if anyone is interested in listening to our new album. We are all between 32 and 34. I don't really care anymore about being relevant, I just am happy to be with that group of people, being very fired up and very focussed, and the people that want to enjoy our music - we love them and we welcome them. In terms of where we fit in - I don't care."

More photos of Coldplay at Austin City Limits festival (16th September 2011):

Pictures: ACL Festival @ Flickr

As Coldplay unveil a trio of tour dates in December, drummer Will Champion tells BBC 6 Music what we can expect from their new record Mylo Xyloto and reveals he's a bundle of nerves. Below is the article from 6 Music today, but you can also download the full audio interview at the multimedia forum now [thanks zzz].

They might have finished the much-anticipated record with producer Brian Eno, but Champion says: "There really is no sense of relief. It's actually almost worse," he told Steve Lamacq. "It's the worst time possible just because there's nothing you can do about it now. It's like when a child leaves home, well they are out in the world now. You've done your best and you're giving it out for people, hopefully to enjoy, but you never know, because it's not out. We've finished it, it's not out, but it's just this waiting game."

The album is out on 24 October and will be swifter than some of their previous records. "In the past, on X&Y, we struggled to finish that because people were coming up saying, 'Oh, you've got to put that one on, you've got to put that one on'," Champion explained. We tried to please everybody and ended up with an album that was maybe 2 or 3 songs too long, so this time we've been very careful. We wanted it to be under 45 minutes."

This news follows the band winning 6 Music's festival headliner vote. Unlike 2005's release of X&Y, Champion also revealed they were able to decide on the tracklisting very quickly and have put a lot of thought into it as a whole body of work: "It's very much compiled to be able to listen to it from start to finish. There was a very strong sense of the story that goes along with the record and how we wanted to tell that story," added the Coldplay drummer. "There's a narrative in there if you choose to look for it. We knew how we wanted it to go and in the end there was really just a question of two songs. We were pretty unanimous in everything which is great. It's a good sign."

Mylo Xyloto is their fifth studio album and features a collaboration with US star Rihanna entitled Princess of China. It's previously been reported that the record is based on a love story which has a happy ending. Will confirmed there is a definite theme to the album with a structure to the tracks. "Every record is a concept album in some way in that people don't just write songs and throw them on in a random order," he said. "Everyone that I know who has released records thinks very carefully about what the first track is. That's crucial. "If you've got a range of dynamics in your songs you want them to come in the right order. It would be pointless to put 6 massive songs followed by 3 really small songs."

Coldplay's jaunt will kick off at the SECC in Glasgow on 3 December, then Manchester MEN (4), finishing with a show at London's 02 Arena (9).

More photos of Coldplay at Austin City Limits festival (16th September 2011):

Pictures: ACL Festival @ Flickr

Coldplay have talked to MTV News (watch a video interview there) while they at this weekend's Austin City Limits fest, about unexpected team-up on the new album Mylo Xyloto - Rihanna. Here's what they had to say online:

Last week, Coldplay made headlines when they announced they'd be teaming with Rihanna on "Princess of China," one of 14 tracks on their upcoming Mylo Xyloto album. And while the news may have left some fans a tad, uh, puzzled, Coldplay say the collaboration was born out of a desire to keep reinventing their sound — not to mention necessity — as they told MTV News this past weekend at the Austin City Limits Festival. "Well, our new record is sort of a story; it's not quite a musical, but it's dangerously close. There's a bit of a love-story thread, so we really needed someone to sing even higher than me," frontman Chris Martin laughed. "[it's] hard, but very possible. You need to be a female really. For all [drummer] Will [Champion]'s good intentions, he [can't do it] ... ("Can't get that high, not these days," Champion added.)

"... So, in like a dream scenario, we had a song that I'd secretly kind of written to see if Rihanna would want to sing it," Martin continued. "And then the rest of the band wanted to keep it, so we came up with the idea of asking her to sing it with us, and, to our great surprise, she said OK."

And as is the case with pretty much everything on Xyloto (due October 25), "Princess of China" finds the band expanding their sonic palette and pushing musical boundaries ... which, they'll have you know, is exactly the point these days. Because, after more than a decade of albums — and sales of more than 50 million worldwide — they feel they've earned the right to try something new.

"Well, her bit on our record is my favorite bit ... when the song came out, it sort of asked for her to be on it. And I think at this point, we have nothing to lose, and so we've been trying some new things and trying to break down the perceived boundaries between different types of music," Martin explained. "Because from where we're sitting, it seems like you can try and sound any way you like nowadays. You don't have to be in a rock box or a hip-hop box or a pop box, and I think it's fun when you embrace that idea."

More photos of Coldplay at Austin City Limits festival (16th September 2011):

Pictures: ACL Festival @ Flickr

It would be a pretty hipster thing to say that the Coldplay show at Austin City Limits Music Festival on Friday was cheesy and overly sincere. But you won't actually hear that. Because all the hipsters were on the other end of the Zilker Park with Kanye West, writes the Dallas Observer music blog.

Sure, Coldplay's music expertly draws out the emotional side of college co-eds, but, aside from popular hipster belief, there is more to the band than aiming to pull at the heartstrings of fans. Nonetheless, their 2011 ACL performance, rather than featuring cuts from their forthcoming record, Mylo Xyloto, found the band pandering to the crowd. They played material from four different albums over the course of their first five songs. The whole show was very much a greatest hits performance...

You've got to believe that they're tired of playing some of the old songs, though. You could hear that much, actually, in the changed arrangements and the improvised lyrics on more than a few songs -- like in "God Put A Smile On My Face," when Chris Martin sang "make some noise if you're having a good time."

The crowd roared in return, as if following some unwritten concert etiquette that says when the lead singer says anything, you cheer, no questions asked. But Martin and Company knew what they were doing. This was a crowd that needed help. It was only capable of focusing on the band when they were playing one of their huge past hits. So, that's what the band focused on.

Every once in a while they'd play some songs from the new record, but they were hard to hear for all the chatter in the crowd. So, Coldplay kept it simple and stuck with the singles. "Yellow," surprisingly, was the second song of the night. Soon after came "Lost" from Viva La Vida, and then "The Scientist."

In addition to playing choice selections from a huge stable of hits, the band used some tricks that they've clearly picked up along the way. One of Coldplay's early influences was The Flaming Lips and in a very Lips like fashion, they dropped hundreds of balloons into the crowd a few songs in. Later, during the encore on "Fix You," which Martin introduced with a modified version of Amy Winehouse's "Rehab," Martin took a note from Bono and ran through the divider in the center of the crowd and climbed the scaffolding at the sound booth. But all of the energy was overshadowed by the fact that Coldplay has been reduced to the role of a babysitter, working tirelessly to maintain the crowd's fleeting attention. Nevermind that Coldplay has a new record coming out and that a massive festival might be a good time to test out some of the new songs. "Clocks" is all this crowd cared to hear, and Coldplay was happy to play it.

But that wasn't the highlight of the set. That came with "Viva La Vida," a triumphant success thanks to the crowd's singing and dancing. The band still has something. Their cinematic songs connect with huge audiences. Sound like a certain Canadian band you might know?

Critics Notebook

Personal Bias: Coldplay started to lose me at their second album, completely lost me at their third, then perked my ears up again on their Brian Eno produced fourth record. It will be interesting to hear what this new one sounds like.

Random Note: Kanye's bass could be heard during the mellow lulls in Coldplay's set.

Random Note #2: Never seen so many people making out at a concert before

By The Way: Chris Martin acknowledged Coldplay's core audience with this improvised lyric on "Everything's Not Lost": "You can feel it in your chest, when your girlfriend wants to watch Coldplay, and all the boys want to watch Kanye West."

Do you agree or disagree with this review? Did you go to the show? Let us know! Post your reviews at the Austin City Limits thread here or simply browse the latest comments, pictures and videos on the 16th September show!

Coldplay at Austin City Limits festival (16th September 2011):

Pictures: ACL Festival @ Flickr

AUSTIN, Texas — For any English band, playing this Texas hipster mecca's long-running PBS music show "Austin City Limits" is a big checkmark on the rock-and-roll bucket list, writes VH1 in a review of yesterday's Austin City Limits Taping. Here is the rest of their review along with song excellent stage set photos from JimmyD on the forums...

Coldplay got their second hash mark on Thursday night, taping a 90-minute special edition of the 37-year-old show just 24 hours before they take the stage for a much bigger crowd just around the corner at Zilker Park as part of the three-day Austin City Limits festival. Like plugging in at New York's Radio City or Nashville's Grand Ole Opry, it's the kind of honor that most bands would kill for just once. Only this time, unlike their 2005 appearance, there was also some "Masterpiece Theater"-style acting involved, as they were taping a show intended to air on New Year's Eve. That time-travel twist required a bit of cold-weather thinking in the midst of one of the hottest summers in Lone Star State history...

As they've done all year at other festival appearances, the band mixed such crowd favorites as "The Scientist" with half a dozen new songs, including one singer Chris Martin said they just finished last month. (And, as they've been doing on this tour, this was all after they walked out to the theme from "Back to the Future"; see above time-travel reference.)

Martin started the night at the piano for the album's gentle coda, which segued right into the driving, triumphant "Hurts Like Heaven," during which the room filled with candy-colored laser blasts from a pair of neon target set pieces at the back of the stage. The new downtown 2,700-capacity "Limits" studio was decked out like a neon blacklight wonderland, with audience members handed paint-splashed T-shirts as they walked in, which were to be kept under wraps until a big reveal later in the show.

The band's gear was also colorized, with brightly hued chalk-like scribblings covering their amps, piano and drums. It's hard to describe the rush of watching a band that plays to tens of thousands on stages so tall you have to crane your neck to see them from the front row as they plug in and play just a few feet off the ground, easily within arm's reach. And if you thought "Yellow" sounded huge in a field with 30,000 of your closest friends, imagine what it's like when you can count the veins popping on Martin's forehead.

For the new, ripping, U2-esque "Major Minor," I took a trip up to the control room and watched as the show's director called out rapid-fire cues while watching a bank of 28 monitors. You can't get a better feel for the band's subtle, easy dynamic than watching isolated hi-def close-ups of all four members loping their way through "Lost!" and observing the unspoken internal rhythm that makes their shows so seamless. Drummer Will Champion cranked it up for "God Put a Smile Upon Your Face," whip-cracking his kit with abandon as if for a moment he thought he was in the Foo Fighters. Ever polite, Martin apologized for being so sweaty — joking that his profuse perspiration is the very thing keeping his band off "The Bachelor" — before he unwrapped the world debut of the final song they finished for their upcoming album Mylo Xyloto. He said the gentle ballad "Up in Flames" — which features a memorable falsetto chorus and hypnotic tick-tock rhythm — was completed just five weeks earlier, just in the nick of time to make the cut.

That tune moved into another new mellow one, the acoustic "Us Against the World," which Martin started over again after dropping a barrage of not-safe-for-PBS f-bombs following a guitar mishap. The second time he got it right, as Champion joined him in perfect harmony on the line "slow it down," with guitarist Jonny Buckland adding in some tasteful, sustained-note Morse code soloing. It wasn't quiet for long, though, as "Politik" exploded with driving drums and piano. By the time Martin tinkled out the first notes of "Viva La Vida" on the piano, the audience was already whoa-oh-oooh-ing along. As it cranked up, they were on their feet, ecstatically clapping and singing along as the song built to its familiar crescendo.

When the whoa-ooohs really kicked in, Martin jumped up on the drum riser and bounced on his toes, his arms held up like a triumphant prizefighter. With the crowd decked out in their paint-splashed T-shirts, Martin counted down to midnight, pretending it was cold outside, even though everyone in the chilly studio knew 85-degree nighttime swelter shortly awaited them. Confetti canons shot out paper butterflies and three screens covered the Day-Glo toys that descended for the new tune "Charlie Brown," whose final line, fittingly, is about glowing in the dark.

The set crashed to a close with another fresh track, the dark, funky "Paradise," which seems ripe for a beat-heavy remix (perhaps with a hip-hop break from pal Jay-Z?). The encore rolled out the driving 1-2-3 punch of the swelling "Clocks," slow-burn epic "Fix You" and recent uplifting single "Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall," which had Martin pogoing along with, and for a brief moment in the middle of, the ecstatic audience.

It was one of those special nights when a band with a major arsenal finds a way to take its giant energy and squeeze it down into a much smaller space, without losing any of their arena-packing magic.

American Songwriter review:

For about 2,100 lucky Coldplay fans who got to attend the band’s Austin City Limits taping Thursday night, the weekend’s Austin City Limits Festival started a little early — and New Year’s Eve came way ahead of schedule. The capacity crowd at the long-running PBS show’s new shared taping/live performance venue, dubbed ACL Live at the Moody Theater, helped the band count down to midnight and ring in 2012, despite the Sept. 15 date and temps in the 90s. Turns out the show will air on Dec. 31, presumably near the midnight hour.

Even before that point, audience members hitting the three-day festival likely decided to head toward Kanye West’s set Friday night; no need for them to try viewing the Brit band from half a mile away after witnessing their tremendously energetic ACL performance. The show, now recording its 37th season (which kicks off October 1), even accommodated at least part of Coldplay’s stage set – which included the audience – during their taping, the band’s second ACL segment in six years. The graffiti that inspired Coldplay’s upcoming album, Mylo Xyloto (out Octber 25) morphed into the stage’s day-glo splatter motif, decorating lead singer Chris Martin’s upright piano, the drum riser and even the band’s guitars in amped-up pastel colors, and T-shirts with glow-in-the-dark symbols taken from the album art were given to floor-level audience members. After a kinetic “Viva La Vida,” fueled by drummer Will Champion’s center-stage tom-and tympani-pounding, and everywhere-at-once Chris Martin’s vocals, the T-shirts went on, the countdown began and confetti flew. Then a matching backdrop resembling a Rube Goldberg contraption (think OK Go’s video, only more primitive and still) came down.

By then, the band had run through half a dozen tunes from the new album (“Hurts Like Heaven,” ‘Major Minus,” “Charlie Brown” and the world debut of a beautifully falsetto-filled “Up in Flames” among them) as well as their biggest hits. With pants tucked into all-terrains that gave them a combat-booted look, the well-rehearsed foursome played tight arrangements of “Yellow,” “In My Place,” “Lost!,” “God Put A Smile Upon Your Face,” a sharp-edged “Violet Hill” and “The Scientist,” frequently evoking an only slightly less anthemic U2, right down to Jonny Buckland’s chiming, Edge-like guitarwork. "It means a lot to us to be playing ‘Austin City Limits’ for the second time,” a buff-looking Martin announced. “We play a lot of places where they never invite us back!” After complimenting the audience, then joking that they say that to all their TV audiences in an effort to pander for appreciation, he added, “It’s tough when you’re from England. Nobody likes you anyway. … Hope your Christmas was OK.”

Spinning, jumping from foot to foot like a boxer and careening from piano to mini-organ to acoustic and electric guitars, Martin stayed in motion, the band and crew moving seamlessly around him. Cursing as he forgot the words to a new song, “Us Against the World,” he and the band plowed on through, never losing momentum. With masterful, gorgeous renditions of “Clocks,” “Fix You” and the closer, “Every Teardrop is a Waterfall,” they reinforced the fact that even self-proclaimed geeks can “rule the world” – or at least, its greatest stages.

Photos of Coldplay (Phil Harvey, stage set) at the Austin City Limits Taping (15th September 2011):

Photo source: Jimmy Dushku (click to view more)