Articles

Cities is a good record from a good young band with loads of potential. It's not brilliant, as some Triangle scene advocates hoped, but it's not bad, as jealous detractors of the Chapel Hill band and its record deal hoped. It's solid.   But what Cities lacks in apogean excellence it makes up for, by default, with local relevance: I doubt this will be the best record released in the Triangle this year, but it just may be the most important.   Of course, the natural response is "Why?" Why would a

Cities is a good record from a good young band with loads of potential. It's not brilliant, as some Triangle scene advocates hoped, but it's not bad, as jealous detractors of the Chapel Hill band and its record deal hoped. It's solid.   But what Cities lacks in apogean excellence it makes up for, by default, with local relevance: I doubt this will be the best record released in the Triangle this year, but it just may be the most important.   Of course, the natural response is "Why?" Why would a

Musicians and politicians have called on Liverpool council to save one of the city's most important cultural centres by ploughing £250,000 into a takeover bid.   Small businesses based in the Parr Street complex have been served with eviction notices, including the celebrated 3345 private members club, and told they must leave by July 31 by rock star Phil Collins's company, which owns it.   The recording studios are the largest outside London and have attracted names such as Pulp, New Order and

Musicians and politicians have called on Liverpool council to save one of the city's most important cultural centres by ploughing £250,000 into a takeover bid.   Small businesses based in the Parr Street complex have been served with eviction notices, including the celebrated 3345 private members club, and told they must leave by July 31 by rock star Phil Collins's company, which owns it.   The recording studios are the largest outside London and have attracted names such as Pulp, New Order and

A SENIOR civil servant and his fiancée have complained about MCD, the concert promoter, to the Equality Tribunal after the company’s security staff allegedly accused them of being drug dealers.   Shane McCarrick, an executive officer in the Department of Agriculture, suffers from Crohn’s disease, a condition that requires him to take steroid tablets at three-hour intervals. His fiancée has type one diabetes and requires regular injections of insulin and carbohydrates in the form of fruit drinks.

Ricky Gervais stakes another claim to being the best satirist around with this interview of Chris Martin, the notoriously right-wing lead singer of Coldplay. Best question:   RG: "Now, at the Conservative Party conference a few years ago, you made a rousing speech saying that if Labour banned foxhunting, you'd leave the country. Now, you did leave, but now you're back. Isn't that hypocritical?" CM: "I just came back to get some stuff, to get my hunting gear - two guns and a knife."   The questio

Coldplay’s concert in Manchester, UK in October 2002 was filmed especially for MTV and was one of the best performances the MEN Arena has ever seen. The gig was shown on MTV on Sunday, October 20th 2002 (did you see it?)   At the time, 'The Scientist' proved too elegiac for American audiences, so they got Clocks while the UK lapped up The Scientist. Then the UK got Clocks too - and it's so tense it sounds like it has been wound up. Chris Martin's piano again dominates with a catchy little phras

When we saw Coldplay at Glastonbury in 1999, they were unknown and unsigned, at the bottom of the bill in the New Bands Tent. A mere three years later, they have become Michael Eavis’ favourite band and were hotly tipped to leave Glastonbury 2002 with the sort of legacy that adorn the houses of Pulp, REM, Travis and The Chemical Brothers for historic performances on the Pyramid Stage. That’s a lot of pressure, but as the power chords of new opener ‘Politik’ blasted out, it looked like they might

Wedding memories as Paltrow and Martin went cruisin'   Coldplay star Chris Martin and his actress wife Gwyneth Paltrow once duetted on her hit Cruisin' at a pal's 2003 wedding.   Paltrow's best friend Julia wanted the couple to sing the song, which the actress recorded for her movie Duets, at her reception. The song, which was a smash-hit in Australia, was originally recorded by Paltrow and Huey Lewis, who played her father in the film.   Watch the clip here [thanks fudge]

AM : Do you think you’ve started something of a trend ? Other musicians have turned their hand to classical music like Elvis Costello ; Sting is about to release an album of lute music and Chris Martin from Coldplay has said that when he’s 40 he wants to go college to study classical music.   PAUL : I can sympathise with Chris Martin because when I’d written Eleanor Rigby in the 1960s I was excited by the idea that this wasn’t a band it was actually just string players. For ’Yesterday’, I had a

Here's an interesting article from the media source who only hours earlier had been so proud about running an exclusive Coldplay ticket competition. That same evening, they write an unfavourable report on the show at the Q Arena:   Coldplay, who many rock critics have tabbed as the next U2, headlined the the Quicken Loans Arena tonight and drew a crowd that I would estimate at about 17,000. The band that hails from Britain failed to answer the lingering questions that I had about about the band.

There's no escaping Joe the Plumber these days. Not even at a rock 'n' roll show.   Less than a week after you-know-who found himself at the center of the final presidential debate, the non-licensed tradesman from Holland, Ohio, was mentioned indirectly a couple of times when the British quartet Coldplay performed Tuesday night at The Q. "You live in the most important state . . . at the moment," frontman Chris Martin told concertgoers, referring to Ohio's pivotal role in the upcoming election.

See a rap verison of Coldplay's Clocks here   [Thanks barrybonds79]

Edinburgh'S biggest nightclub has sparked a row by planning to give itself a name similar to one of its main rivals.   The former Revolution nightclub on Lothian Road has unveiled plans to reopen as a club called Liquid, to the annoyance of the operators of the Liquid Room on Victoria Street. The troubled nightspot had been re-launched as a live music venue - Gig- in October, but this is understood to have flopped, despite hopes it would attract high-profile acts.   Now the club's owner, Lumin

You may wish to read Coldplaying.com's review of the unofficial DVD released this year. It is posted here.

01. Even Bettter Than Song One (7.3Mb) 02. What If I Had A Gun (5.9Mb) 03. White Shadows Go By And I Can't Get The Connection Out Of My Head (7.5Mb) 04. Still Fixing Venus (6.0Mb) 05. Take Talk Block Rock (7.8Mb) 06. X Roses & Y Sunshine (6.4Mb) 07. Check Out The Cold Hard Speed Of Sound (4.4Mb) 08. A Badd Voyager Message (5.4Mb) 09. Low Life 69 (7.0Mb) 10. You Waiting For The Hardest Part Get Busy (5.3Mb) 11. Laura Swallowed The Police (3.5Mb) 12. Twisted Girl Time (4.5Mb) Bonus T

The first reviews are in for Coldplay's forthcoming Prospekt's March EP. First up, The Ephemeric website, who failed to comment on the final track 'Now My Feet Wont Touch the Ground', which hints that the review is based purely on the previews released by EMI last week:   Apparently one Coldplay album this year is not enough for us. Viva La Vida was a very good album too by the way, a vast improvement on the mediocrity that was X&Y. But even so I don't think anyone really expected they would

In early 2007, EMI was a mess. The U.K.-based music company — the smallest of the four major labels — had lost $500 million in a year, its market share had slipped to nine percent, and marquee artists Radiohead and Paul McCartney had jumped ship.   When private equity firm Terra Firma bought the label for $4.7 billion in May, many speculated that CEO Guy Hands would dismantle the company, retaining the profitable publishing arm and back catalog. Instead, on January 15th, he announced a vast over

In the world of experimental and abstract music, there are no more than two degrees of separation between Brian Eno and everyone else. This is the man who, after all, is credited with inventing ambient music, and his influence is deep and wide.   But Eno, 60, is also the man who produced or co-produced some of history's biggest pop and rock albums, including U2's "The Joshua Tree" and the best-selling album of 2008, Coldplay's "Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends."   Eno, born in Suffolk

An interesting article on the subject of peer envy has been published today in the Daily Mail, from a college cohort of Coldplay's, way back when at University College London:   The Coldplay concert is what pushed me over the edge - standing in the middle of a 70,000-strong crowd who were all singing Yellow while giant sun-coloured balloons bounced on their heads. It was at that point I had something of a life crisis. If there's one thing that annoys me about Coldplay, it's not their dodgy lyric

Coldplay is starting to get too good at its job, report Paste Magazine. At the writing session for Viva La Vida, Chris Martin and Co. got a little overzealous, writing too much to fit on one album. The tracks that were left off Viva La Vida might make an appearance as another album as soon as next year.   Viva La Vida was released in June and produced by Brian Eno. The next album is widely rumored to be almost completed because of all the extra material from that recording session. The speculati

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

Actress Gwyneth Paltrow has revealed what many non-Coldplay fans have often suspected – her husband’s music sends people to sleep.   But far from being a dig at Chris Martin, her revelation was a tribute to his hands-on parenting skills. Gwyneth said the singer’s biggest fans are their children – daughter Apple, aged three, and son Moses, nearly two. And the Coldplay frontman can often be found singing as he puts them to bed. “He sings lullabies all the time. He’ll sing funny joke songs. They lo

Getting into the middle of a plagiarism dispute between hot British band Coldplay and legendary American guitarist Joe Satriani has made Winnipeg music teacher Andrew Wasson a minor Internet star, writes the Toronto Star.   Last December, Wasson, owner of Creative Guitar Studio, did a nine-minute analysis of the similarities between Coldplay's 2009 Grammy-winning song of the year, "Viva La Vida," and Satriani's 2004 instrumental, "If I Could Fly."   His conclusion, based on comparisons of rhythm

UK court bites into Apple logo case   The Beatles and Apple Computer Inc faced off in court on Wednesday in a trademark dispute triggered by Apple's move into the music business through its iTunes download service.   Apple Corps Ltd, owned by Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, John Lennon's widow Yoko Ono and the estate of George Harrison, has sued Apple Computer twice before over the companies' competing fruit logos.   He noted that the Apple Computer logo is displayed when users buy songs from the i