ColdplayingfromKansas

I think the point I'm trying to make is that, regardless of who's fault it was, we still ended up with a sub-par end product :P As for the bolded part--I agree. I feel like the band should have gone with Stargate on the tracks they knew they wanted to have that pop sound and gone with someone who had some experience in producing with a band for the others. Pop-style production on tracks like Everglow and Up&Up just don't work that well, in my opinion. Granted, I know very little about the process of producing albums, so maybe splitting the production tasks up like that would have just been too much work :shrug:

Really? :thinking: You're the first one I've heard say this. I thought we got the leak from a CD rip that someone managed to get when Walmart put it out early? I usually get distracted by something or other while typing up a comment and get ninja'd by like five people :lol:

^ I feel like I'm the only person in the world who likes A Whisper :lol: At this point, I'm completely blaming the production choices on Stargate because, well, they're the producers :lol: The main problems I have found are: 1) Too many random little "pop" effects that don't serve any purpose in the song whatsoever. Things like extra reverb on Chris's voice, weird noises that only pop up once or twice and are never heard again, etc. Stuff like that can be done well, but in my opinion that just didn't happen on any of the songs 2) Mixing of the instruments is just plain bad. The most grievous of these is on Up&Up. The piano is barely audible and NOEL GALLAGHER'S GUITAR SOLO IS REPRESSED WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT. Drums seem too loud, etc. Combined it just zaps all the energy from what was supposed to be a great buildup (compare it to the live version, which nails that buildup). I've only listened to the album once, but from what I remember, Fun, Army of One, and X Marks the Spot had some problems like that too.

I will give this a shot. Just gonna list the b-sides, unreleased, live-only, etc. I actually kind of like the sample, but to each their own :awesome: And seconded :nod:

*Petitions for Coldplay's next three albums to be made up of nothing but old Viva outtakes :awesome: *

I honestly think I could write a 10-page essay on everything wrong with this song. I just :facepalm: Chris what on earth inspired you to write such bland, unoriginal, objectifying, pandering lyrics, and whatever it is, please keep it far away from me :uhoh: *crawls back into hole*

One of the things that I find truly stunning about the Viva era is that when you take the album, the ep, the various b-sides and standalone singles (like Lhuna), exclusive live tracks (like Don Quixote and The Dubliners), and the leaked demos, we have more content by far than from any other era. Just doing a quick count based on what I have in my iTunes library . . . that's 28 songs. At least (I know I'm probably missing some). I know that some people maybe don't hold the album in as high of favor as I do, but take a look through the song roster for the Viva era and find one song with cheesy lyrics, one song with bad production, one song that's boring or that seems too "safe." If you find one, let me know :P Now, I know that no band on earth can be expected to emulate a particular type of genius over and over again. That's fine, sometimes people and circumstances just line up perfectly and allow something beautiful to happen that can't ever be replicated. Whatever. MX comes along . . . okay, a little poppy for my taste, UAtW seems a little safe, DLIBYH could have had some better production choices. Can't really expect another Viva, after all. No biggie. They'll reinvent themselves again for LP6 like they did with LP2 and LP4. GS comes along . . . um, okaayy, some real cheese moments, Another's Arms ruined by production, everything sounds like a Top 40 artist tried to rewrite Parachutes. Big swing and a miss for me, but Chris is going through some rough stuff, everything will work out for LP7. Aaaaand AHFoD gets here and just . . . bad production. Bad production everywhere. The anticipated Rebirth that happens every other era (and which has already been delayed by the unplanned Ghost Stories) has been gagged, blindfolded, and stuffed in a closet by weird unnecessary Top 40 tricks and poor mixing. One song just sounds so blatantly un-Coldplay-like that I wonder if it was written by the real life equivalent of the apes in the AoaL video (and yes, I am talking about X Marks the Spot, how did you know? :awesome: ). If I tilt my head and squint a little, I can see some decent songs clinging to life under it all. Have I enjoyed what I have heard of AHFoD? Of course. Will it relieve me of my "Oldplay" bias and take a spot in my top four albums? Not at this point, no. It, unfortunately, completes what has become Coldplay's "problem trio" (cheesiness/too much Top 40 influence, blandness, production). Granted, many will disagree with me I'm sure, but the big problem with MX was the bad execution of pop influences, the big problem with GS was the blandness, and now the problem with AHFoD is the production. To sum up this rather long and rambling post . . . hopefully as Coldplay continue to reinvent themselves and gear themselves up for LP8 (if and when it may come), they take into consideration the thoughts and concerns of some of their biggest fans. Our whining and complaining may seem mean-spirited at times, but that's only because we've invested so much in this band that we want to see them succeed with creating musical masterpieces that we know they are capable of. We don't expect (or want) ARoBttH 2.0 or Viva 2.0, but we want to see you create magic again.

It seems I spoke too soon the other day with saying this, but thank you once again to Sparky and the mods for doing a great job and getting the forums up and running again. Album leaks are always an interesting time around here :nice: ----- I managed to get some of my thoughts posted just before the forums went down again after the link. I've only listened to the album once the morning it leaked but it seems I share a similar opinion with lots of others on Up&Up -Freaking great concept for a track. Lyrical journey is top notch. Buildup is fantastic. Two guitar solos and a total of 6+ minutes--it's hard to go wrong with that. So WHY THE FREAKING HECK DID THEY PRODUCE IT THE WAY THEY DID?! Is it because Stargate has zero rock producing experience prior to this? Is it because the band themselves wanted it to be as stripped back as it was? What happened? Even before I was halfway through the album I was itching for it to get to Up&Up because the way it had been described made it sound like it could knock ARoBttH off the top of my favorite song list. Who the heck would muffle a guitar solo that's supposed to be the climax of a song? What happened to the piano? Is it just that the leak I listened to wasn't the best quality? Once Friday rolls around will my mind change? In short, really disappointed. The live version from the TIDAL concert made my top 5 favorite Coldplay song list, but the studio version just seems so empty . . . doesn't come close to emulating that energy and buildup. :disappointed:

:lol: You and I had the same thoughts on those. I thought PoC would forever be my most hated Coldplay song until I heard X Marks the Spot. There is literally nothing about it that makes me think it should be on a Coldplay album rather than the album of some random hiphop artist

It always makes me laugh at just how quickly the forums go down under the massive tidal wave of humanity looking for a link to the leak. If you don't get a working link within about 10 minutes, you're out of luck for the next several hours :lol: I'm pleasantly surprised at the reactions so far--figured there would be a lot more polarizing opinions (maybe it's too early for that yet?). I managed to get one full listen in on the Soundcloud link before it got taken down. Not a bad album, just two really big complaints on my end that were mostly overshadowed by the good points. Another successful Leak Day for the record books. This one was particularly fun. Thank you Sparky and the mods for working to make sure everything went smoothly (well, as smoothly as the album-leaking of the world's biggest band could possibly go :P ) and for getting us back up and running! :nice:

After doing the first listen-through, I honestly don't know how to feel about this. The hearts of each song are pretty good, but they're drowned in god-awful production that makes them all sound like boring, unoriginal Top 40 crap. Like, honestly the entire middle of the album just sounded like the same song with a few base differences. Liked AHFoD. Great opener, got me pumped up. Sounds a lot better than the snippet led me to believe. Hasn't lost the magic of the live version. Birds is okay? I'm not sure how to feel about it. . . . I actually kind of like HFtW. It's like a better Princess of China? The lyrics are a little wtf, but whatever they did to Chris's voice in the chorus, I like it :P Everglow is a little more underwhelming in the context of the album, but still not too bad. Thought I was going to like Army of One . . . I do like the part about his heart being his gun, but that's about it. And my God, X Marks the Spot might have the absolute worst lyrics that Chris has ever written. "You're a treasure"? Really? How much more objectifying can you get? This might actually be worse than PoC. I can't think of a single redeeming thing Fun isn't too bad. Again, suffers from awful production that strips out all of what could have made it a good song. Kaleidoscope . . . I like the old-timey-record effect thing at the beginning. Reminds me of the Viva la Vida Suite version of Death Will Never Conquer. Obama was surprisingly unnoticeable lol Amazing Day. Okay? It's grown on me since I first heard it. Nothing spectacular. Color Spectrum - was hoping for something more Life in Technicolor-y but what can you do :P Up&Up . . . ehhhh. Live version was better. I still like it, but it didn't make me go "wow." Jonny's solo was great but WHY ON EARTH DID THEY MESS WITH NOEL'S SOLO I AM RAGING SO HARD WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT gaaahhhhhh ---- For now, I like AHFoD more than GS simply on the merit of the lyrics alone. I was hoping the album would break my Oldplay bias and knock Parachutes out of my top 4, but right now it's sitting at number 5 (better than GS and MX). IF the production wasn't so god-awful cheesy, I honestly think it would be sitting even with X&Y at #3 on my favorites list. Score: 6.5-7/10 Decent album, ruined by Stargate

dat transition into HFtW :lol: I also kind of like the chorus for HFtW, big stadium sound "I'm feeling drunk and high, so high, so high" wtf Chris lol

Whoa this drumbeat/bass combo is very HLH edit: FOOL'S GOLD THUNDER LINE!!!

Doooo ittt Listening to it right now. Great quality, full album

Someone update the thread title :lol:

EVERYONE CHECK LP7 THREAD FOR THE SOUNDCLOUD LINK

:dance: BUCKLE UP EVERYONE I AM LISTENING TO AHFOD HERE WE GOOOOOOO

:dance: BUCKLE UP EVERYONE I AM LISTENING TO AHFOD HERE WE GOOOOOOO

Wait, is this really happening now?

:lol: Agreed! I love Chris's voice on the rest of the song (except maybe when he hits that high note on "everglow"), but this part just makes me cringe a little

Debating braving the weather and the tons of BF shoppers to go check my local Walmart *looks outside, sees it's sleeting* Yeah no, maybe later :laugh3:

Alabama, huh? A little far away for me, but if that Walmart has put them out early then maybe others have too Plus now we know they've been shipped :sneaky:

Really? I think you're in the minority there, but that's all right :nice: Personally, I think their closers consistently rank among the best songs of their albums, but they've never been my favorite tracks. It's usually the penultimate tracks that wind up being the ones I really like, oddly enough (ARoBttH, Twisted Logic, DaAHF, DLIBYH, Ghost Story)

Okay so after listening to it, I really like it :awesome: Not as good as Up&Up, but better than Amazing Day and AoaL. Likes: -Chris's voooiiiicceee <3 The rawness of it is just amazing. I can't remember the last song we got that was like that -PIANO -GUITAR -The lyrics are actually really cool omg. I especially like the second stanza (with the eagle and goddess line) and the "life is as short as the falling of snow" -The little sound effect that sounds like it came out of Oceans. Cool little subtle thing that made me go "oooh" Dislikes: -Gwyneth's "mm hey" or whatever it is she's doing. Her voice sounds fine from what I can hear, but it's kind of one of those generic fillers that makes me think of a Beyoncé song and takes away from the otherwise really emotional vocals -Not a big fan of the drumwork here (sorry Will! ilu). I think it would have worked better if they'd kept the original drums, but I'm still not even sold on those. Maybe it's the rather generic rhythm? I'm kind of curious as to what it would sound like if they used a shaker or tambourine instead, just for something a little different. -There's something about it that I can't quite put my finger on . . . but it didn't really "grab" me like The Scientist or Trouble did the first time (I know, I know, unfair to compare it to those two). It won't make my top ten, but I already like it more than anything off GS (and most stuff off MX) Score: 7/10 :D

^ I believe that's how others are getting it, yes. Still not available for us Americans though :P