Famous Old Painter

I think Chris is just describing Swans at the start

Apparently this album will include explicit content. That’s a first, right?

The issue isn’t that guitar and bass has gone away, it’s still there as much as ever. The issue is they’re now drowned in a wall of synths and noises, whereas in the past they were given room to breathe.

Continuing in the tradition of single covers which are clearly better than album covers

Coldplay traditionally don’t release music videos until a few weeks/a month after release so I’m not expecting any music videos tomorrow

Just heard the snippets. They’re so short I don’t know how people can make judgements on anything just yet

They are dead but I'm kind of OK with that. I don't really want another AROBTTH, as much as I love it, and I do love it a lot. It's very much an album of its time, another one would feel regressive at this point. AROBTTH was a lengthy album as it was, it had a ton of b-sides, then X&Y took that sound and ran it into the ground. We don't need any more songs in that style. Viva is a different story though. That album still sounds as fresh and vital today as it did 10 years ago. More to the point, they introduced a whole bunch of new, exciting elements to their sound. They could've done so much with it. Yet most of those new elements were simply abandoned when Mylo Xyloto came out. There was so much potential for future directions after Viva, and it still feels like they have some unfinished business on that front. I highly doubt Everyday Life will pick up where Viva left off though.

Despite Jonny confirming the Amazon tracklist, there are some rude people on r/coldplay who are still in complete denial.

Adelaide, Australia ACST GMT+10:30

AHFOD wasn't BAD bad but there's still a hell of a lot wrong with it. It's probably their worst album, maybe second worst on a really good day. I guess it's just depressing to see a band with so much creative potential burn it all on something so flat and generic.

They might have planned to split it at one point, but changed their minds

The Coldplay reddit are in complete denial that the Amazon leak is real. I'm not saying it definately is, but there's like a 75% chance. "I don't like it, therefore it's fake" is not a great argument.

I see this being an hour long at most

Man, I really want to be excited for the new album. Honestly. But every bit of info we get makes me think they haven't completely moved on from AHFoD yet.

Doesn't matter, it still looks like an image flip. Which they already did on AHFOD. If they really wanted to signify a brand new era, they should've done something more creative.

I really don't like the flipping of the image, it's so lazy. Ah well, it's still easier on the eye than AHFOD

You're absolutely right, Coldplay can do whatever they want to do. At the same time, I'm allowed to feel disappointed if they happen to do something I don't enjoy.

I don't know where this idea of re-recording old songs came from, but I'm pretty confident it won't be that. Maybe they'll redo some unreleased material, but it would be really out of character for them to be looking back to their old stuff all of a sudden.

I'm a bit nervous about LP8. I was hoping the MX-AHFOD pop thing was just a phase, but maybe not? Maybe this is just who they'll be going forward. Would be a big shame if that's the case. Unrelated note, did a HQ version of the acoustic Lovers in Japan ever surface? It's one of my favourite recordings from the band, but the version I've got sounds like it was recorded underwater :/

There's experimental and then there's Coldplay experimental. The album might be a little weirder than usual but they're hardly going to drop a Daughters record. I'd say we can expect the usual number of singles.

I remember people saying AHFoD would be a psychedelia record, or that Ghost Stories would be a return to the Oldplay sound. This looks promising but let's not jump to conclusions just yet

So the EP. AICTAIY is promising but ruined by the production. ALIENS is good too but it has MX written all over it. If nothing else, ALIENS has made me realise how disjointed MX was in retrospect. Neither rank anywhere near the Oldplay stuff. The rest is very much AHFOD era Coldplay. Hypnotised is the most traditional sounding sure, but it's still coated in that modern Coldplay cheese.

My quick thoughts on the EP All I Can Think About Is You - I really wish the production was better as it's easily the best thing Coldplay have come up with in the post-GS era. It gives me hope that future Coldplay releases will be worth hearing. I just wish the outro wasn't so noisy. Miracles (Someone Special) - I didn't really like the original Miracles, so the prospect of hearing another version with Big Sean didn't thrill me. Even though it's turned out to be a fairly different song, the original Miracles was a lot better. I really wish Coldplay would move away from this sound. Kind of destroys the hope I got from AICTAIY. ALIENS - It's a great song and I'm glad they've finally released it. I kind of mentally separate it from the rest of the EP as it's probably about 7-8 years old now. I'm really pleased to have it, and perhaps the resurrection is a hint that Coldplay are thinking of pursing this direction again. Also makes me wonder what kind of album MX could've been. Someone Just Like This (Toyko Remix) - Tbh I don't mind the original, I view it more as a good Chainsmokers song than a bad Coldplay song. It doesn't work at all live though. I kind of wish they'd just stuck the original on here. Hypnotised - Never understood all the fuss, it just feels like a 6 minute version of Amazing Day to me. It's alright enough I suppose, sounds more Coldplay-ish than the pop stuff they were doing on AHFOD. Still not huge on it though. I'd give it a 5/10. ALIENS is pretty great, and AICTAIY shows a lot of potential. Those are the only songs I can see myself coming back to, and probably not that often.

It's possible they changed the lyrics for this release. But I'm wondering if the renewed relevance of the lyrics is why they resurrected it for the EP in the first place.

I don't recall anything about Eno working on Ghost Stories. It also seems really unlikely that Coldplay brought back Markus and Eno just for this song, especially when the rest of the EP is produced by Rik, Daniel and Bill. I'll bet you anything it's just an MX leftover they polished up for this release.