CP-EST

I would say Moon Music is mixed alright considering what their focus with that "product" was - very pop oriented and comfortable listen, playing with billion of different styles throughout the album, but keeping it very even, not letting any instrumental shine too much to not break the balance of the whole album. So, I think they have done quite good job with making each song sound like Moon Music song. But does each individual song sound good? - That depends on taste haha. I don't think there is anyone here to blame doing poor job with anything, if anything we can blame the band's (mostly Chris' of course) intentions of going very polished pop direction with MOTS era. I think the best example is iAAM, which most of the fans want to compare to VLV era, but as a product to me iAAM sounds almost incomparably different to any VLV stuff. VLV sound was very rich and colorful and letting all of the instrumental to be alive and rock, while Moon Music implementation takes the idea of VLV era sound, makes it very compressed and puts it as a background of Chris' vocals. To me iAAM sounds very claustrophobic, that kind of song deserved more breathing and richness, not just with mixing, but everything about it. Yeah, Everyday Life's mixing was different, but the whole focus of with those songs and album and was different. Hopefully the "Coldplay" album goes back to that way, where every millisecond of production and mixing/mastering is about making the record sound like classic Coldplay without any compromises.

Got to listen it! I would say this album felt like shit loads of hard work and expensive production. I avoid judging it too much after first listen, as I want to listen it multiple times in different kind of moments to let it settle in. But yeah I would say this felt like the most complete, rich and best allround production they have ever had. Maybe I will be less impressed when I get to listen it repeatedly. Let's see 😆 Talking about song material, probably I would rank this album somewhere in the upper middle part of their list of albums, I haven't thought it through yet.

Just gonna keep arguing. He will still get writing credit on whatever his songs are re-recorded even when he's not involved. So, this is not why he was not invited for re-recordings.

I would like to know the same. I'm a dummy as well.

I doubt that he always asks for writing credit when he's involved in producing. So it's a false fact, unless you have inside information. 😆 For sure his style with working on songs almost always means he's also involved in writing and arranging so he gets deserved writing credit, but there definitely exists some songs, where he's mentioned only as a producer not writer. So I don't think we can yet say Max Martin didn't touch Good Feelings at all, he might have done some tiny bits.

I think there seem to be certain criterias for the lead singles of the albums. When looking back, if I'm not wrong, first singles are without featuring artists and more universally representative of the album, that's what FLIFIL was. So, then a lot of points would have still supported Good Feelings to be at least the second single, because that's when they usually bring out featuring artists. But I guess the points against it were: not that unique really - kind of similar to AOAL and My Universe, so that's where they went for We Pray instead. I might be wrong, that's just my interpretation of their decisions, but indeed Good Feelings deserved to be a great summer hit.

Tbh, I've been thinking the same about Biutyful. I didn't like the song really, but for me it grew into a good show closer over the few years. Now, I do really like FLIFIL as a song, but something about it doesn't quite feel right as a stadium show closer - maybe it needs time to grow into it and have some little changes at the end or maybe there's something else coming up as a closer from Moon Music. I'm yet to experience FLIFIL as a show closer, but seeing videos FLIFIL feels somehow quite static and restrained, although it grows into a good climax, Biutyful felt more flowy and filling the stadium with energy in a weird way and the outro for it was worked out really well.

Yeah after finding time to listen it properly, I think it's fake or demo. The ending sounds super amateur to me, mixing is off etc. Prove me wrong or I will find out when the album releases and realise Coldplay's production is actually thad bad

Oh gosh, chill. It was just a little joke about your original way of reporting it, like you're aggressively wondering who did it. Wasn't not an accusation by any means.

lol, usually the first one to report the smell is responsible

My opinion in a nutshell: I think it's really well done, overall good vibes, but goes to a list of "not interesting" songs - don't want to say boring. In Coldplay catalog it's filling in another gap. It's definitely mixing a few things and adding a little new piece of puzzle there. It's unique in a way, that it's a quite laid back song, but really elevates for a poppy chorus and climax. So in a way for me it mixes the essence of Magic and energy of Higher Power. The production is actually quite nuanced and the ambient textures really elevate the verses. After a few listens I really got into appreciating the production. It's a very pleasant listen, nothing super interesting, but well balanced and atmospheric. It breathes well and isn't too tightly packaged. The songwriting could have used a few more nuances and twists, but it's difficult to point out what exactly, I guess in the end it's just very Coldplay song. Meanwhile I like that it sounds organic and not overly forced, but this is not a song which gave them chances to make something super interesting. So the song just seems one of those very straightforward ones, just how they've been coming from Chris in the past decade. The problem with this song is that the climax only works properly in live performance. In conclusion, have to talk about it in a context that this is supposed an introduction and first taste of the Moon Music. Yeah it's giving me really good hopes for Moon Music album, because I definitely liked the overall atmospheric and more organic vibe of FLIFIL. For now it gave me hope it's going to be at least better than MOTS and AHFOD. This lead single definitely is more alternative sounding than Higher Power and AOAL, so I hope it's a sign for the rest of the album

FLIFIL is sounding like a very big tune. The climax seems to go to heaven. Haven't heard great quality and full song, but sound mix in this official snippet seems quite full and well balanced, you can hear them all and it is definitely sounding like rock band. I guess the feeling is currently that it is definitely something different and new, can imagine it work really well on stadium. Let's see

Good Feelings being soundchecked?

Just a another reference for getting things ready. Getting ducks lined up - idiom for getting prepared and organised. Considering the amount of tweets and playfulness today, maybe it's really about getting ready for some news for today's new moon. Unless they are excited about X&Y anniversary today 😆 But yeah, the hint about Alien Radio recharging makes me think that something will start to appear through Alien Radio before any official confirmed news.

Yeah, it's been mentioned. Although it doesn't confirm anything yet, it seems like chances are very high this snippet represents a song that is going to be on the album and maybe released as single.

Yeah, sharing lyrics or some references would be nothing new actually. In Paradise "every tear, a waterfall" connecting to Every Teardrop is a Waterfall is another little example. Having some lines repeated word by word in another song would be really cool, if it sounds natural. It's like an echo effect in album context. But so far Coldplay has instead been using repetive sound motifs or same chord progressions appearing in several songs over the album.

Maybe for the first time... They release the whole album at once. Album should be finished anyway now. But yeah I'd be more than happy with single and album announcement with all the extras you mentioned and some new tour dates announcements soon.

It didn't really change anything as it was already clear something was about to be released in upcoming weeks. Let's talk again when we have the date and title. 😀 Honestly at this point I actually prefer it to be a surprise release. Although they have built up the anticipation already and fans are expecting something, it still would be really cool. But they haven't really done surprise release for singles or have they? Edit: SJLT was? I start to remember now...

Should be solved now

It would be interesting to see if they figure out how to get moon into all album covers, because Parachutes was one of the easiest ones 😀 But I think there's better and more creative ways to tease, if they're messing with album covers and canvases endlessly it's kind of underwhelming in my opinion.

Edit: nevermind. It was answered already

To be honest, I was a bit disappointed as well. AOAL has aged well and Higher Power->AOAL combination at the start of concert is ace. Only reason that made me think of removing it, was knowing that Good Feelings might turn into sounding a bit similar. So that would give them reasons to start mixing things up a bit if they want to play some new songs. But let's see, Moon Music and new songs in setlist is currently an imaginary thing.

Apparently Chris is more scared of Luton FC fans than Coldplay fans. I guess we have to raise our game to get new music. 😆

I think they refered to this: https://www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/28135833/coldplay-track-little-simz/

It's funny that you also in the end made the connection to Flower Moon, which was the previous full moon we had few days ago. Few pages back I wrote about the Flower Moon, because its alternative name is Egg Laying Moon, so it would have connection with the "nest with eggs" emoji they posted on X(Twitter) this week. But it might be just a random coincidence with that emoji. Maybe it's going to be like Flower Moon is for the starting of Moon Music release process and Harvest Moon in September/October is when we get it. Just a funny theory.