Long Live Life

Eeh ba gum it's chilly up top! (Yorkshire speak for the linguistically perplexed) http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5088/5209177310_96c887b25f.jpg' alt='5209177310_96c887b25f.jpg'>

A nice two shot but I've forgotten their screenames ... sorry!

Tower Bridge by night (the one that's not called London :))

The Erasmus ... our venue for the next 5 hours or so...

Monique and Custard.... (no it's not a cartoon or an exotic dish by Jamie Oliver!) (custard has yet to join the forum - he should do with his encyclopdic knowledge of the band !)

Nattatoullie has gone too for the Viva name badge look: Nattoulie, Petra, Krunal

Now I'd been contemplating all day whether on not there was a possibility that the "suprise" may well be shooting the video for Christmas lights.... What was the reason behind the unsure dates? .... 3 fans speculate whether the 25th/ 26th thing was the band keeping an eye on the weather forecast (it had been forecast to snow in London on the evening of the 25th....) L to R: (timothy) gallant08, ice coldplay and Jillie Blue (my date for the evening)

Give something back? There is another way of looking at this ... as fans we take, take, take.. this was our opportunity to do something ourselves for the band which was very appreciated by Chris (he said so). We often talk about "Coldplay karma"... here was our chance for us to do something for the band for a change. Freezing for a couple of hours (from someone who does this every weekend!) is nothing really in the grand scheme of things, given how many hours they put into touring, song writing etc.

My thoughts exactly! Loved the evening. As I said it was disappointing not to see the band, but that is an indication of how much we all love the band, not whinging I was on cloud 9 last night and enjoyed every minute of it.

I was genuinely amazed how many Americans had flown over specially for this event. It shows the dedication of American fans, which may go someway to explain why the band appear to have a special affection for the US. But no one can say they were tricked.... Coldplay HQ never said you would be meeting the band, and aside from Phil (who I didn't see), I thought the peeps who they said were on the boat after all... I personally really enjoyed the evening, and it's not every day you can say you were in a pop video, least still a COLDPLAY video!

JNR... JNR = January Next Release?

Think about it from their point of view. Had they announced it was a video shoot they know the nature of this forum and it would have been Tweeted and Facebooked round the blogosphere and half of London would have turned up and ruined the shoot. It's the nature of the beast nowadays. The schedules for shooting of some of our top TV shows are treated like National Top Secrets nowadays to avoid hoardes of people in the background ruining the shoot/ shouting. It was disappointing however though not to get to meet the band or get a signed copy of the single. Perhaps they will send us something, or invite just us 100 to a little Chirstmas party of theirs?

Great news! Christmas Lights is great news! I look forward to hearing it! Christmas is a magical time, this year with Coldplay it looks set to be even more so!

Bad handwriting is a sign of extreme intelligence!

The acoustic version (sadly only on YouTube) of CHris Martin's piano (with violin) version of Yellow @ MountainView, California last year is the most beautiful version of it I've ever heard. I hope they will record it one day.

Surely there was someone else from the UK who saw it?

You can find a place that no one knows Where money talks, and streets are gold Someone stands in every door And if they speak, they break the law (Who was that mouth?) (Who was that mouth?) Ask a question - blank faces Read the news and turn the pages Watch them play a different game And no one knows your name The words of PSB may be apt for the evening. So what do they have in store for us? Coldplay karoke - Chris draws names from a hat to sing with them on stage? Coldplaying Oscars - for the wittiest, longest, most read posts etc? The band shows us Guy's photos from his competition

Me to! Do u think Coldplay would ever perform this song live with either an orchestra or string quartet?

Yes it's amazing how much this song has been overplayed on TV (and yet I personalluy don't think the song suffers from over-familiarity like many other songs do when overplayed). I've lost count of shows but I think Blackadder Rides Again, BBC News (election coverage), ITV news (election coverage) and BBC News (Milliband election). Isn't it used on the X-Factor as well, as well as the iTunes commercial? Any ideas to the Qs. about the instruments in my OP BTW anyone?

The band certainly changed substantially between 2005 and 2008. As they said in the Brian Eno docu: " a moisturised, well-manicured version of Coldplay". I've lost track of the number of TV shows where I've heard VLV play now, and yet not so long ago they were adamant their music wouldn't be used for commercial purposes/ TV shows/ film Chris is definitely much more self-assured than he was before now as well. Yes, he still does self-deprecation like only the upper-middle class English do, but he now has a cocky, schoolboyesque sense of humour which shines through at the press conferences. His genuine self-angst seems gone now (or well hidden). I must say though that I warmed to the band much more when I found out more about them, and VLV was the album to do it for me. I still listen to it now, but LIJ, VLV, DAAHF, and COF are my most listened to tracks. I really liked VH when it came out, but don't listent to it much now.

Did anyone else here see the Brian Eno documentary last weekend on BBC4? It was a bit disappointing that for the Coldplay section they didn't elaborate on what Eno had actually done (I guess so he remains enigmatic) to tweak it. The Coldplay section was just covered by showing the VLV video in full, which although nice to see was a let down in the context of the docu as there was little else.

Covers I also have several covers of this song, incl. the Pet Shop Boys. Here is a gorgeous classical cover : [ame= ] [/ame]

My favourite is actually LIJ, but VLV keeps drawing me back to it...

I've heard VLV so many times I've lost count. I have personal reasons too why it means a lot to me, but the thing I've noticed is that rather like a well written joke or sitcom, you never tire of listening to it (I'm thinking Fawlty Towers here!) and each time you hear it it sounds like the first time you have done so. If ever there was a showcase for Chris Martin's writing or Brian Eno's producing talent - here it is. VLV was awesome when I first heard it and it remains so today. I've never tired of hearing it once. It sounds just as fresh as it did back in 2008 to me, and I'm still finding little nuances to the song in the way it was produced. I regarded it as work of high art at the time - something that trascended just music. I still do. For once the art achieved the recognition that it deserved, with no1 being attained (amazingly their first UK no 1) on both sides of the Atlantic. The beauty of the strings, the uplifting riff and yet at the same time the deeply melanchony lyrics. It is one of very few songs (The Pet Shop Boys are also able to achieve this with me), where I can "tune" into either the music or the lyrics and be uplifted or downbeat. Coldplay operate on several levels with their music, and I'm not just referring to the obvious allegories that many have (in)correctly drawn from the lyrics of Viva La Vida. Even now, having heard it so many times, I still wonder how Eno created those mystical and distorted sounds we hear - [ame= ] [/ame] 0-13s: underlying melody: is this a piano or an earlier instrument? Fortepiano ? 1:38 - 1:52: guitar distorted + distorted harpsichord?/ Pedal steel guitar? I've often VLV called Baroque Pop - I think this song will have as much longevity as its categorisation. Chris Martin, Coldpay, Eno, thankyou from the bottom of my heart for this beautiful song. Truly etheral.

UK airdate Will this air in the UK?