Coldplay do not "deflower virgins" while on tour. The clean-living band insist their backstage antics are limited to changing their clothes and they never take advantage of groupies like a lot of rockers.

Guitarist Johnny Buckland [pictured] said: "There's sort of a whole heap of things that we do before the show. "Obviously we get changed, we do a bit of singing, play the guitar and just sort of relax for a bit before. But we don't deflower any virgins or anything like that."

Meanwhile, frontman Chris Martin has admitted their live shows are influenced by flamboyant performers the Flaming Lips. He added to Rolling Stone magazine: "Any theatrics on our part tend to be inspired by the Flaming Lips. So confetti probably came from seeing their show and thinking, 'Oh, confetti looks good,' and then thinking, 'Well, how can we make confetti our own?' "And we thought, 'Oh, let's make them all little butterflies.' That actually comes from taking my kids to the butterfly house at the zoo."

More on the Rolling Stone article here

When Rolling Stone’s Brian Hiatt hit the road with Coldplay for a recent Viva la Vida gig, the band gave him unprecedented access into their behind-the-scenes world — opening up about their sets (”We’re not going to be Springsteen and play for three hours”), stage outfits (”Are we gonna look ridiculous?”) and why Chris Martin is frontman (”He’s like the sort of engine of us”).

Click here for exclusive photos of the band prepping to go onstage, rehearsal shots and live photos, complete with commentary from the quartet.

Minutes before showtime in Coldplay's darkened Dallas dressing room, Chris Martin cracks open a bottle of Jameson. He takes a shot, throws his head back and gargles loudly. At least a dozen pill bottles litter the floor next to Martin's yoga mat. But it's all a lot less decadent than it seems: The pills are vitamins, and the whiskey is mostly to lubricate Martin's throat for the many quavering high notes to come. "It's pretty exciting back here, right?" cracks drummer Will Champion, who spends most of his pre-show time playing a PlayStation 3 soccer game. "It's just like Mötley Crüe!"

More on this article and photos here [thanks jenjie]

When the going gets tough, Coldplay get going - their separate ways...

Fortunately, the UK's biggest rock band always manage to kiss and make up. Until their next big bust-up, that is. Frontman Chris Martin tells us that he and the other three members of Coldplay have parted company a whopping SIX times. The most recent split was just last week after it emerged they were being sued by American guitarist Joe Satriani.

Happily, the fab four - who are currently on the London leg of their incredible UK tour - can't stay away from one another for long. Chatting to us backstage ahead of their stomping gig at London's O2 Arena, Chris admitted: "We have split up on this tour. "Every time we do, we get back together about 20 minutes later - we don't even have time to announce it! How many times has it happened this tour? Probably six or seven.

Read the full article here [thanks Aphrophet]

How do you make the O2 Arena your own? It's hard to make a gig feel intimate when you have a 20,000 capacity crowd, but you could start by jumping off the stage with your band and bouncing up to a narrow corner to play 'Green Eyes' and 'Death Will Never Conquer', wedged in to the aisle with your mate on harmonica.

Even though your mate happens to be comic genius Simon Pegg, it's hard not to feel you're in a much smaller local space, in a spontaneous lock-in style singalong with the biggest band in the universe on hand to entertain.

The party atmosphere in the arena was aided by Coldplay's brand of big bucks-fuelled euphoria and unashamed nod to cheesy one-liners and crowd-pleasing antics - giant 'Yellow' balloons drop from the ceiling; a magical burst of paper butterflies churn from every side of the arena and fall on the delighted crowd during 'Vida la Viva' and everyone throws their hands in the air, faces turned up towards the sky; Chris Martin sings 'Fix You' and people are moved because let's face it, we all want someone gorgeous to write a beautiful song for us out of of love.

Read the full review article here

By the time it ends next September at Wembley Stadium, 15 months after it began in Brixton, Coldplay’s Viva La Vida tour will have played 108 dates and taken them to 17 countries. They will have sold well over one million tickets and confirmed themselves as earth’s most popular group until U2 are back.

Last night they returned to the city where they formed, staked their claim for greatness and emerged triumphant. Surely nobody can doubt them now. In truth, we shouldn’t be surprised. Singer, guitarist and pianist Chris Martin’s outer geek has always obscured his inner take-no-prisoners ambition.

That geek momentarily re-surfaced when he anointed London as “the best crowd in the world” (I bet he says that to all the cities) and instigated a left-side, right-side cheering competition Westlife might spurn on naffness grounds. He just can’t help himself —and Coldplay still dress like farmers.No matter. As Martin’s actress wife Gwyneth Paltrow bobbed merrily among the masses, albeit with her own security, Coldplay were everything you could hope for from a world-bestriding act (apart from a savagely truncated Talk) and much more.

Read the full review article here

Coldplay formed a new supergroup at the opening show of their three date O2 Arena residency last night with comic actor Simon Pegg, writes Gigwise this morning.

Midway through the set, much to the sell-out crowd's surprise, the band walked into the first tier of the audience. With a solitary spotlight beaming on them, Chris Martin announced: “In homage to Robbie Williams rejoining Take That, we're going to form our own supergroup, ladies and gentlemen it's Simon Pegg!”

A somewhat nervous looking Pegg shuffled on and performed harmonica with the band on 'Green Eyes' and the Will Champion sung 'Death Will Never Conquer'. Pegg is a close friend of Chris Martin and is godfather to his daughter with Gwyneth Paltrow, Apple.

Earlier on in the triumphant set, while beckoning the crowd to sing with him during 'Yellow', Martin made a cheeky reference to American guitarist Joe Satriani who claims 'Viva La Vida' borrows substantial portions of his 2004 track 'If I Could Fly'. Martin joked: “Given that we've only got two hit singles and one of them is about to be taken away by some guitarist, give it all you can.”

As always Martin was in a playful and energetic mood throughout. After the opening tracks 'Life In Technicolor' and 'Violet Hill', he beamed: “We love coming back home – we're called Coldplay and we're from London!'

During 'In My Place, he almost risked injury, almost falling into the crowd when he slid on the stage. Poignant moments in the set were 'Yellow' when hundreds of giant balloons were released from the ceiling, the rousing 'Fix You' and the set closer 'The Scientist'. The band continue their O2 Arena residency tonight.

Click through to Gigwise here to see some exclusive photos of the gig.

The date is 29 November. It’s a Saturday night and I’m clutching two tickets for Coldplay’s grand homecoming gig in my right hand. It’s a strange and not entirely comfortable sensation, writes Noripcord.com.

I’ve climbed the concrete steps to Sheffield’s Hallam FM Arena on just two occasions, and for good reason, too; its enormous stage generally plays host to revolving cast of nastiness – Cliff Richard is coming soon, along with a line-up of 80’s has-beens, High School Musical On Ice (I kid you not), and Girls Aloud. Actually, I wouldn’t mind seeing Girls Aloud, but there’s very little else to get excited about on the Coming Attractions list.

As my pulse begins to race (the work of those steps, not a surge of adrenaline), I start questioning myself: what I’m hoping to get out of tonight? A snarky put-down masked as a live review? Probably. It would be fun to write, but would anyone derive any value from such an article? Is there anybody out there who hasn’t made their mind up about Coldplay yet? I doubt it.

Read the full article at Noripcord here

We've said it before but it bears repeating: Coldplay are unfairly maligned. Just because they make popular songs, are hugely rich and yet don't conform to every rock-band cliche in the book (OK, we'll pass over the one about the frontman marrying a film star), it seems necessary to mock their every move. No wonder they've been taken to American hearts: there they actually like and encourage success.

Perhaps all those who denegrate Coldplay as being whiny bedwetting cohorts of Keane and Snow Patrol would think differently if they saw them live. At the Arena last night, Martin and co were awesomely powerful, Jonny Buckland's riffs set to stadium and anthem after anthem blowing away any of the bad moods they'd suggested they'd been in.

True, Martin doesn't so much like the sound of his own voice as like the sound of the crowd's - too often he opts for simply playing along as the audience bellow the words to Yellow. It's fun for a while, and then a little annoying - you don't pay £42.50 to hear the bloke next to you roaring the words. But in a sense it does prove how effortless Martin and co find writing memorable, clear-eyed pop songs.

Read the full review article here

Coldplay's UK arena tour arrived in Manchester last night (December 11th) – and you can see exclusive photographs on Gigwise here (a taster is below...)

The band wowed a sold out crowd at the Manchester Evening News Arena. Dressed in their distressed military uniforms, the group rattled through tracks from their new album 'Viva La Vida and Death and All His Friends'.

But it was Coldplay's more established hits such as 'Yellow' and 'Fix You' that created the biggest response from the crowd. Their tour continues tonight (December 12th) in Manchester before arriving in London on Sunday (December 14th).

Joe Satriani's suing of Coldplay has become one of the hot topics of late 2008. And it doesn't look like it's going away soon.

The latest addition to the online debate is a fine article on the Idolator website where their 'Idolawyer' (clever, yes?) muses on how the case might pan out in court. You'll have to put aside any prejudice of whose music is 'better' to appreciate this case, but the potential scenarios are interesting. Idolator's lawyer writes: "Assuming that Joe and his publisher legitimately own the copyright to If I Could Fly, assuming the song meets the minimal criteria for originality (a given), and further assuming that he has no direct evidence of infringement, the court will apply the following two-step inquiry:

1. Whether the defendant had access to the plaintiff's song prior to creation of Viva La Vida.

2. Whether the work of the alleged infringer is substantially similar to If I Could Fly."

Read the full article at Music Radar here

Coldplay.com caught up with Coldplay's latest support act. Here is their interview: London-based bliss-poppers The High Wire begin their run of support slots with Coldplay in Manchester tonight. We called up their frontman, Tim Crompton, to find out a bit more about them.

Hello Tim. Are you all set for your support slots?

Oh goodness, no. Not being all that familiar with arena touring, I have no idea how to be prepared for it. I'm just excited that I won't be at work for a few days.

Are you looking forward to it?

Absolutely. Even just sound-checking on a big stage and playing guitar really loud will be great fun.

What's the biggest gig The High Wire have played so far?

We've only done small ones really. We went and played at CMJ in New York at the end of October, which was big in the sense of scary and cool to do.>

Read the full interview article at Coldplay.com here

That Chris Martin, he’s a dark horse. Actually, what are we saying? No he isn’t. He’s a man who usually screams up for what he believes in and uses the back of his hands like portable billboards for worthy causes.

But apparently, he was capable of keeping one little secret – the band’s crush on Take That, and their desire to be the Manchester four piece’s warm up act. “We were in the dressing room yesterday and, for whatever reason, we started singing Back For Good,” Chris told Coldplay.com last month. “We sang the whole thing, word for word, with all the right chords on our piano, without having to learn it or anything. It was great… if Take That want us to open for them, we’ll do it. The only problem is that we’ll have to get down the gym for a bit.” Or, CityLife reckons, just do a few more lengths on that runway he likes to work up a sweat on live…

Read the full preview article here

If there was a book called, Critiquing Music for Dummies, somewhere inside would be a passage about how you must hate Coldplay and anything they put out. In fact, giving Coldplay poor reviews has been a growing trend over the years. The band's latest LP Viva La Vida or Death And All His Friends changed that quite a bit. While it was far from their Joshua Tree, Viva La Vida was a solid album that had the band heading in the right direction.

Only 5 short months later, the most legally downloaded album of all time has yet to fade away. Despite this, Coldplay still decided to release their latest effort, Prospekt's March. The EP contains 8 tracks, including 6 brand new songs from the Viva La Vida sessions last year. The remaining tracks are "Lost +", and "Lovers in Japan (Osaka Sun Mix)". The first is the original "Lost!" as we know it with a perfect hint of Jay-Z during the bridge. "Lovers in Japan (Osaka Sun Mix)" is also very much like the original, except it is no longer attached to "Reign of Love," and contains slight differences in vocal harmonies.

Chis Martin described the new material on the EP as tracks that the band was "shy about putting out."

Read the full review article here [thanks icecoldplay]

Is it theft, borrowing, unconscious plagiarism or sheer coincidence? Coldplay is being taken to court over allegations it pinched a tune by US guitarist Joe Satriani. Satriani claims Coldplay's song Viva la Vida is a direct rip-off of his melody If I Could Fly and he wants any and all profits from the Coldplay hit.

The two songs have been overlayed on the video sharing website YouTube just to prove the point. Coldplay says any similarity is entirely coincidental and that Satriani did not write or have any influence on their song. But when it comes to other pop songs, copying is nothing new. Perhaps most famously, the Beatles' George Harrison was forced to pay almost $1 million in royalties after a court found he had subconsciously copied The Chiffons's He's So Fine.

And eyebrows were raised at the similarities between the opening bass line bars of The Jam's song Start and the Beatles' Taxman, but in that case The Jam's Paul Weller admitted to being under the influence of the Beatles.

Copyright Lawyer Michael Easton from Brett Oaten Solicitors explains how damages might be assessed in the Coldplay case. "[You need to assess if] there's any kind of culpability on the defendant's part. So if it's agreed that they subconsciously infringed then that might be something that reduces damages," he said. "But you'd also look at things like the extent to which the market for the original work's been affected and what kind of profits the defendant made as a result of the infringement.

"Another aspect which is often significant in these cases is looking at the likelihood that the writer, the defendant, was exposed to the original song. So the question might come down to a case of whether [singer] Chris Martin has a Joe Satriani album in his collection."

And that makes composing increasingly tricky for artists, says Elder. "The average musician is a fairly nerdy kind of person who is very, very interested in music and listens to a lot of it and presumably have a vast amount of music swimming around in their head," he said.

"And if this is the case, they can often stumble on something and say, well I don't know where I got that but it sounds pretty good and I'm going to make a song out of it. If there is some kind of huge settlement in favour of Joe Satriani, then it really does create a situation where other writers are going to be saying 'I wonder whether I'm plagiarising something. 'How am I going to prove to people that I haven't been plagiarising this?'."

Read the full article here

Coldplay have politely responded to Joe Satriani's plagarism claim, The Times Online report today...

In what is turning into the most civilised argument in music history, Coldplay have refuted Joe Satriani’s claim that they plagarised his work while praising his talent and offering up a stream of pleasantries.

The British band broke their silence over the American guitarist’s law suit last night, posting a statement on their website that goes against the usual rules of rock rivalry and would no doubt make the famously fiery Oasis and Sex Pistols ill.

Answering Satriani’s claim that parts of their No 1 hit Viva La Vida were copied, the band wrote: “With the greatest possible respect to Joe Satriani, we have now unfortunately found it necessary to respond publicly to his allegations. If there are any similarities between our two pieces of music, they are entirely coincidental, and just as surprising to us as to him. Joe Satriani is a great musician, but he did not write or have any influence on the song Viva La Vida. We respectfully ask him to accept our assurances of this and wish him well with all future endeavours.”

Last week, Satriani filed a copyright infringement suit, at Los Angeles federal court, claiming Viva La Vida incorporates “substantial original portions” of his 2004 instrumental If I Could Fly. The feted guitarist, who has played alongside Mick Jagger, is seeking a jury trial, damages and “any and all profits” attributable to the alleged copyright infringement.

Despite releasing a string of successful songs since they found fame in 2000, Viva La Vida is Coldplay's biggest ever hit. It went straight to No 1 on the UK charts when it was released in June. Last week the band were nominated for the prestigious Song of the Year and Record of the Year Grammy awards for the track.

Song-writing credits list singer Chris Martin, bass player Guy Berryman, guitarist Johnny Buckland and drummer Will Champion. The album the song came from, Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends, is also the band's most successful, despite huge success with their debut Parachutes and the epic A Rush of Blood To The Head.

The band have sold more music than any other act in the world during 2008.

Source: timesonline.co.uk

If ever there was a man who sums up the phrase “dance like there's nobody watching” it’s Chris Martin.

The Coldplay singer jigged and bounced around the ECHO arena stage last night like an over-excited puppy, clearly loving every minute. The packed crowd responded with equal glee, singing, cheering whooping and hollering. That’s the surprising thing about a Coldplay gig. For a band which made its name with some downright miserable lyrics (“Nobody said it was easy, no one ever said it would be this hard” anyone?), they put on a refreshingly cheerful show.

They’ve already done more than 80 gigs around the world promoting new album Viva la Vida. It’s clear that this is arena-craft at its most refined. As Chris pointed out, in a moment eerily reminiscent of Bruce Forsyth: “We’ve done 87 of these shows now and you could well be our number one crowd yet.”

Read the full review article here

So revered are Coldplay that they practically simply have to turn up at gigs to stoke their fans. Indeed, at times here it felt as if Chris Martin could have just knocked off early, in such good voice was his audience, to the point of almost drowning the singer out.

Yet this was a performance with surprising heart, soul, energy and even intimacy from a band often knocked for being expertly bland. We did get all the predictable arena rock tricks – giant balloons bouncing around during Yellow; an acoustic interlude which saw all four members appear on a podium at the back of the hall; coloured confetti falling from the ceiling come the encore.

But there were many more revelatory moments: old songs were tinkered with gleefully (God Put a Smile Upon Your Face and Talk got a ravey electronic makeover); new songs were played with a degree of heart that belied the drabness of Coldplay's fourth album Viva La Vida (or Death And All His Friends).

Read the full review article here

Leading online music app last.fm has released its most popular songs, albums and artists of 2008. The rankings come from last.fm's database, based on number of listeners. The music had to be released in 2008 to qualify for the charts, reports readwriteweb.com.

The Top 10 tracks is absolutely dominated by Coldplay's Viva la Vida, with 6 songs - including numbers 1 and 2. The title track was number 1, with more than three million listens in about 6 months. Coldplay also features at 5, 6, 8 and 9. This is reminiscent of the dominance of the Billboard singles chart the Beatles enjoyed in April 1964!

MGMT also had multiple tracks in the top 10, with entries at numbers 3, 4 and 10. The New York synthpop group also took the number 1 slot in the Top Artists category, but only because Coldplay didn't qualify - it's limited to artists who released their debut album this year. MGMT's album "Oracular Spectacular" gained it over 398,000 Last.fm fans.

The only other artist to make the top 10 tracks was Katy Perry at number 7 with 'I kissed a girl'.

Guess what's the number 1 album? Coldplay's Viva la Vida. Coldplay did have an impressive online launch for that much-anticipated album, which certainly helped. Indeed the album was also the biggest selling iTunes album download of 2008.

Best Artist (artists who have released their debut album this year)

1. MGMT - Oracular Spectacular

2. The Ting Tings - We Started Nothing

3. Sara Bareilles - Little Voice

4. Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes

5. Katy Perry - One Of The Boys

6. The Last Shadow Puppets - The Age of the Understatement

7. Foals - Antidotes

8. Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago

9. Does It Offend You, Yeah? - You Have No Idea What You're Getting Yourself Into

10. Santogold - Santogold

Best Album

1. Coldplay - Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends

2. MGMT - Oracular Spectacular

3. Portishead - Third

4. Nine Inch Nails - Ghosts I-IV

5. The Ting Tings - We Started Nothing

6. The Kooks - Konk

7. Death Cab for Cutie - Narrow Stairs

8. Hot Chip - Made In The Dark

9. Jack Johnson - Sleep Through The Static

10. Sigur Rós - Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust

Best Track

1. Coldplay - Viva La Vida

2. Coldplay - Violet Hill

3. MGMT - Time To Pretend

4. MGMT - Electric Feel

5. Coldplay - Life In Technicolour

6. Coldplay - Cemeteries of London

7. Katy Perry - I Kissed A Girl

8. Coldplay - 42

9. Coldplay - Strawberry Swing

10. MGMT - Kids

Source: readwriteweb.com

They may have met at university in London, but Coldplay will always count Liverpool as home, reports the Liverpool Echo.

They’re now one of the biggest bands in the world, but before they were famous, and while they were first riding the crest of a wave, they were based in Parr Street Studio. Under the watchful eye of Grammy award winning Scouse producer Ken Nelson they recorded their first two albums – Parachutes and A Rush Of Blood To The Head – plus singles Shiver, Yellow, Trouble, In My Place and The Scientist in the heart of the city.

And the band, who play the Echo arena on Sunday, still hold it close to their hearts. They’re massive Echo And The Bunnymen fans and last week late one night, while I was working on a supplement to honour the Liverpool legends I got a text from Chris Martin. It read: “Echo and the Bunnymen are the musical equivalent to Marmite. You either love them or you’re a ****.”

Read the full preview article and enjoy pre-show updates in the Coldplay Live forum here

In case you missed it the first time round, Coldplaying.com caught up with Oxfam's Pete Lusby to find out more about life on tour, volunteering and Oxfam. Pete is currently touring with Coldplay, promoting Oxfam's campaigns to concert-goers. Joined by teams of dedicated volunteers, Oxfam are raising awareness of, and advising of how we can all take action to overcome, poverty.

Hi Pete! Thanks for sparing some of your time to answer some questions. How did you become involved with Oxfam?

I'd always known about it from the Oxfam shops in Britain. I learnt more through a Development Studies course at university.. and seeing Oxfam at Glastonbury Festival. I started out working for Oxfam as an intern. I volunteered full-time for six months from April 2007. I was working as the assistant coordinator on the Oxfam GB Festivals programme. We were doing a similar thing to what we do on band tours. Volunteer campaigners helped over 101'000 festival-goers sign a Climate Change petition. We also had a chill-out/Fairtrade coffee/dance tent and an Oxfam Campervan, at some of the festivals which was great fun to work on. After that I worked on 'Oxjam', Oxfam's fundraising music festival in UK, another band tour with Klaxons in the UK, and then on fundraising challenge events like the London Marathon and Trailwalker. Then Coldplay came up... and I jumped at the chance.

What’s your favourite thing about working for Oxfam?

I love meeting people who are enthusiastic about Oxfam's work to fight poverty, whether that's our volunteers or music fans who see us out there at the venues. It's good to know that the work we are doing can make a difference to people's lives. I won't lie to you though.. working at festivals and gigs is a great buzz too.

Read the full interview article here [thanks jenjie]

One trek the group Stars didn't expect to make recently was to Ottawa to open for Coldplay, a spur-of-the-moment offer the band couldn't turn down, reports the Edmonton Sun.

"We had a surprise phone call the day before because the person that was opening for them couldn't get across the border," Amy Millan says. "They called in Stars on the Bat-phone, we pulled our troops together and made it happen. It was really fun."

But don't expect Millan to know what the press thought about it. "I think the thing is I spend enough time with myself and I don't really need to go and read about myself," she says. "I think what's most important to me are our fans and our peers. If the fans seem to love the new record and my friends love the new record then I know I've done something good."

You may remember recently Roadie #42 posted a blog where he talked about Ricardo, the drummer from the Make A Wish Foundation... well now you can watch the a video of Ricardo playing The Scientist with Coldplay here [thanks mimixxx]

The Denver show brings a guest at soundcheck. We are joined by a chap called Ricardo Leon, who's here with the Make A Wish foundation - his wish being to play drums with Coldplay. He makes his way to the stage on a motorised wheelchair, which does make one wonder how he'd manage with a drumkit.

Once on the drumstool though, there's no question. It soon becomes clear that not only is he an excellent timekeeper, but he also has the parts down to any Coldplay song they care to mention. They give Politik a crack, then he suggests Amsterdam. Chris sheepishly admits that he can't for the life of him remember how to play it (even though Ricardo will clearly know it inside and out). They move on to The Scientist, before getting a bit more rock with Sleep Chant.

Minutes before showtime in Coldplay's darkened Dallas dressing room, Chris Martin cracks open a bottle of Jameson. He takes a shot, throws his head back and gargles loudly.

At least a dozen pill bottles litter the floor next to Martin's yoga mat. But it's all a lot less decadent than it seems: The pills are vitamins, and the whiskey is mostly to lubricate Martin's throat for the many quavering high notes to come. "It's pretty exciting back here, right?" cracks drummer Will Champion, who spends most of his pre-show time playing a PlayStation 3 soccer game. "It's just like Mötley Crüe!"

Coldplay are in the middle of the biggest tour of their career, and their latest album, Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends, has made them the top-selling band in the world this year. (They have trouble accepting the news: "Most of the time we just feel like losers," says laid-back bassist Guy Berryman.)

Read the full article at Rolling Stone here

Eugene Francis Jnr and the Juniors are supporting Coldplay on the first half of the UK tour. Coldplay.com called up Eugene after the first night in Sheffield to find out a bit more about his band.

Hello Eugene. How was the first night of the tour?

It was perfect. I'm here with Pete the tour manager now and we're just reliving it. We were just saying how smooth everything was and how lovely all the Coldplay crew were.

Was it busy when you were on?

Maybe I'm bigging ourselves up here but I'd like to think it was 60 percent full. Put it this way I tried counting every single human being in the audience and I couldn't. So I take it there were more than fifty people there.

And were they receptive?

Yeah - there was lots of cheering, whooping and hollering, although a lot of it was probably from my mum, who was there.

Is this tour a big thing for the Francis family then?

Yeah - eight dates in big places. I think this is probably is the defining point, where instead of your mum going, "Get a real job", she's going,"You must be doing alright because everyone knows Coldplay".

How did you come to be doing the tour?

I'd like to think it was done on musical merit and that the guys like what I have done before and the solo project I've moved onto now. Last year when we first started peddling it about using Eugene Francis Junior and the Juniors, with the whole band, the Coldplay lads did come out and watch us. But I also knew the guys in college.

How did you meet them?

We were in the same halls of residence in university. And all four of us have tried our best to keep in touch since.

Were you at Coldplay's first gig?

Yeah, I was indeed. There was a time were they opened for my band at the time and I opened for them when they were Starfish. But they've seen a lot of musical water pass under the bridge since then. I'd like to think that both camps have got better.

Which of them do you know best?

Will was the first person I befriended and Will and I are, to this day, still very close.

It must have been quite odd watching your college pals become big rock stars.

Absolutely. But I'm also very proud knowing that good guys sometimes do finish first and it's not necessarily your rock n roll ethos or how much you talk up your game. It's nice to see that the music dictates how people perceive you and what people buy.

When did you first realise that they were quite good?

Tobe honest with you, the first time I saw Jonny play guitar with Chris when they were just jamming in a room, it gave me goosebumps. It just made me think of all the wrongs and the rights in the world.

Did you ever make music with them?

Not too much. Me and Jonny used to jam and me and Champs used to write songs about 24-hour off-licenses, but that's about as far as it went because I had my thing and they had their's.

And you never lost touch with them?

There have been temporary times when I've been away or they've been away but, no, we've always kept in touch.

Have they changed much as people?

No. Their dress sense and their hairstyles have got better. But they still live their lives with the same morals and they treat all human beings the same. And I think that's what's carried them so far.

For those who haven't heard it, what does your music sound like?

I would call it folk-tronica. Not folk as in the Lindisfarne sense but folk as in honest music, but with a lot of electronica. Someone else has described it as Bob Dylan meets Aphex Twin but I don't think it's as heavy as that.

Do you have an album out?

Yes, it was out over the summer and it's called The Golden Beatle. It's like a psychedelic adventure.

And you're doing this tour with a band?

Yeah. It's the perfect time to take the full seven-piece out.

Have you played venues this big before?

Yeah, but only between the hours of ten at night and seven in the morning in a little world known as Dreamland.

Were you quite nervous?

I'm not going to say nervous - it's bad not to be nervous. It was more surreal than anything. The sound was the best we've ever had it and the soundcheck was the longest we'd ever had. But when the house lights come on, you realise you can't focus on the people on the back of the room and it really dawns on you that it is quite a large space. The only way I can describe it is that it's like the difference between bungee jumping and skydiving. If something goes horribly wrong with either, you're going to die in the same way. It's just on different scales. Because you're further from the ground and you're falling through clouds. It's just all a lot more surreal if you're skydiving.

Did you watch Coldplay last night?

I did. I watched them with my mother. We had some really good seats.They've got a great show with psychedelic butterflies and lots of movement over three stages. And now they've got a repertoire where they can drag anything they want off the last four albums. And it definitely brings tears to my eyes when I see Will playing the guitar and singing with all his heart.

Final question, what's you're favourite Coldplay song?

I knew you were going to ask that, so I've done a bit of research! My favourite song ever is off Parachutes and it's called We Never Change. I've probably cried like a small child to that. Parachutes is my favourite album because it's so honest. On Rush Of Blood, I think my favourite song is Green Eyes. On X&Y it would be The Hardest Part, and on Viva it would without doubt be Lovers In Japan purely because of the emotions, the way certain things make you feel. That song just makes me want to go out and live the greatest day of my life.

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Coldplay have come a long way since they played Birmingham’s Ronnie Scott’s in 2000, just as their album Parachutes was hitting the headlines.

Now they are commanding three nights at the National Indoor Arena and are on the crest of a wave after the success of their most recent album Viva la Vida. When the concert opened with Strauss, it was as if we were in for a classical spectacular – and in some ways we were. The show was nothing if not a spectacle with Coldplay pulling out all the stops for special effects.

We had laser beams, we had huge globes lowering from the ceiling and projecting images, we had confetti, we had huge painted backdrops, we had moving images and flashing lights – it was one crowd-pleaser after another.

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