lennyrott1

Not sure how to feel about the theory of yet another album version or EP. It's been a chaotic release schedule but I can't deny enjoying the ride. I still am hopeful for tracks like M.U.S.I.C, Opus No. 5, Earthling, 2 Aliens and more getting final releases at some point. I like the production style for Moon Music overall so I'd love to hear more material from the era. Man in the Moon feels like it comes from the MOTS/ The Astronaut era, which I also enjoy.

Here comes my overly long review after listening to the album about 5 times through. Putting my longer thoughts in spoilers because nobody needs that much on one page. I think this album right now is a somewhere between a 7.5-8/10 for me. Moon Music (10/10): Terrific opener. The strings are beautiful and sad, the piano soft and sweet. Chris’s lyrics are surprising to me, there’s a clear ambition and message kicking off this album setting a tone that may feel a bit more serious. Feelislikeimfallinginlove (7/10): Fantastic chorus with lovely synths and power chords and a dreamy outro help push it over the edge of being middling. The forgettable verses and soft instrumentals leave the song feeling a bit empty. The La La La’s also feels oddly trite given the previous song had good lyrics. WE PRAY (8/10): A really amazing beat that utilizes Viva-esque strings and an organic-sounding hip hop beat to dramatic effect. The melody, lyrics and chorus are memorable and all the features are terrific, especially Lil Simz. It does lack a bit of edge and could use a bigger instrumental moment, rather than again leaning on "la la la's," but it rounds out to a solid and catchy listen. Jupiter (9/10): A lovely surprise. The acoustic guitar is fresh, the vocal delivery is amazing, the backing vocals and effects are delightful and the orchestra kicking at the end makes it feel like a soundtrack to a 2000’s indie move, but in a good way. The hidden outros are also really lovely. I want a full version of 2 Aliens! Good Feelings (8.5/10): As far as Coldplay’s limited dance numbers go, this might take the cake or at least it’s on par with AOAL. The exquisite production and Nile Rogers guitar feature creates a groovy, fun and delightful listen that I can’t not dance to. Arya Starr’s guest vocals and the ending "la la la's" are perfectly tuned for summer singalongs. I don't know why they don't just drop the single, it's really good. Rainbow (9/10): An interesting listen though one that feels almost too meandering in the middle times. The opening Sigur Ros inspired piece is exciting and the “Angel Song” segment is very lovely and calming. I really enjoy the Maya Angelou outro as well. iAAM (8/10): A fantastic little stadium rock track harkening back to the Viva days. It’s one of the best instrumentals on the album and an energizing guitar solo, but does feel a bit short and rushed compared to other songs that draw on pacing wise. Aeterna (7/10): Nocturnal house music with a touch of funk bass. It’s fun to dance to, it’s catchy and has really interesting production changes. The outro feels a tiny bit out of place paired with this song but is very joyful to listen to. Could see this being a fan favorite or a song people hate. All My Love (9/10): Classic Coldplay piano ballad with crisp, gorgeous production and a passionate vocal performance. It’s short and to the point, Jonny’s solo is gorgeous and the crescendo with strings is nicely balanced though I wish the solo was a tiny bit louder. One World (9/10): I’m a sucker for this stuff. The orchestral piece is heart wrenchingly beautiful. The final moment where the band steps in is also wonderful though I think I would have preferred only string sections to close out the record. The "In the end it's just love" feels a little hamfisted. The surprise hidden track is just fine, a love letter to Glastonburgy I guess. Not really counting it.

So I plan on putting my track rankings and thoughs on there later but for now after just listening to the album on a beautiful and sunny fall day and looking at changing leaves, which may sway my rankings, I agree with folks that this is a really good album that will probably sit up with MX, Everyday Life and X&Y for me. (My favorites are parachutes, viva and AROBTTH) -- so definitely feeling like I may enjoy this record more than AHFOD and GS and DEFINITELY a huge leap over MOTS. I don't want to spoil to much here -- we're only about a day away anyways, but the biggest surprise to me on this album is that it does try to address a question and a striving to feel like everything in this crazy world makes sense, and so that means there are moments that feel actually fun and moments that feel extraordinarily meloncholy. I idenfitied with it more than I thought I would, for any critics out there saying it's dumb and cheesy or just "Live, Laugh, Love," they are the exact people that this music should reach.

In the midst of excitement I have to express some minor frustration with this Rolling Stone piece (and likey many pieces to come). I feel like critics have just not been able to make a solid assessment of Coldplay over the past decade. To some extent, I get it. MOTS is probably a ver mid album for most people. But you read these reviews and they talk about a lot of how cheesy Chris is and how the lyrics are a little too universalist and hopeful or whatever, but then just rubber stamp a 7/10. Idk, just feels like a cop out score. I wish people just gave reviews with strong opinions -- even if those opinions are negative. I say this because I listen to a lot of music and there's a lot of pop on par with Coldplay or even worse that gets more preaise and excitement around it. There's just this taboo hanging over the band where people now don't want to say they are terrible but they also don't want to say they are great.

I could believe the MOTS III rumor though I don't trust anything coming up on that site and haven't been thinking ahead of Moon Music. One reason to believe it, they said in interviews for a few years now they are in the process of working on a film and that the writer's strike got in the way (mid 2023) so it seems like it has been in development for a long time. There's also the fact that we know there's been a lot of songs not on Moon Music that have either been mentioned by the band (i.e. UFO II, Robots, Weirdo) and demos that leaked (Earthling, The Only One) that could be well suited for a musical. Some additional thoughts on the musical but spoilerwarning as I'll discuss leaks:

I'm feeling really pleased that a lot of the album is still a total mystery and that the wait is practically over, so I'm not really feeling impatient. FLIFIL was an okay first single that I expect to enjoy more on the album. We Pray is really solid but I've already played it out. iAAM as an unofficial early single was really great too, probably my favorite. I know we've basically already heard All My Love, Aeterna, Good Feelings and One World, but I'm still anxious to hear how they're produced in the final cut. And ultimately having Jupiter, Moon Music and 🌈 as tracks we haven't heard at all leaves room for suprises to round out hopefully a really solid album.

I definitely remember Ghost Stories leaking a week before but that was a really quick and concentrated album rollout so it didn't feel significant. AHFOD leaked around one week before and I remember listening to it in a department store and someone asked what I was listening to and I had to lie. It was during Fun and I was making a face because I didn't like it (and still don't, haha). EL also leaked maybe a few days before? I remember listening to it in my living room at like 7 a.m. and the sun was coming in during Sunrise and it was super magical. I don't remember with MOTS... but for Moon Music, whether it leaks or whether I wait until Friday, I want to find a good quiet spot outside with a view of the sky if possible.

Yeah I hear that and also agree it could be a career-spanning album for #10. There is still a lot of the album's run time left to unpack though, and I'm so interested in how longtime fans feel on Oct. 11th after having the chance to listen to the whole thing through a bunch. To offer the flip side to the idea the album feels too safe or too mid, I do think there's something to be said about an album that flows well, is really pretty and offers a chill cohesive vibe in this day and age. This remains to be seen given the very different sounds of say We Pray and Good Feelings, but I'm wondering if Moon Music is going to feel like a spiritual sequal to Ghost Stories. When that album first dropped, I was a little disappointed in the production style and felt it was just a bit dull and slow. But overtime I think it became more of a cult classic amongst fans for just having a really strong emotional appeal to it. It may not blow our socks off, but it really adds a specific sort of feeling to the Coldplay catalogue that feels singular and important -- an album that's all about loving yourself and being really good at processing negative emotions into something positive. It might be a ridiculous comparison to make, but the new Nick Cave album is about this and is really profound and powerful in my opinion. Maybe Moon Music is the pop version of that hahaha

You're 100% on to something I agree with which could lead fans to be torn about Moon Music. Despite being universally considered their worst album, MOTS was adventurous in what they band aimed to do -- space pop combined with nostalgiac 80's & 70's sounds, all produced with a futuristic Max Martin deep synthesizer sheen. But in execution, pacing and production it often felt awkward and overdone. It did away with Jonny almost entirely and took away the organic feel that makes the band resonate, but successfully did include some good features and eyebrow raising moments (think My Universe outro). I think the band so often wants to have it both ways: we want the catchy pop song but also the alternative feeling song. Having Human Heart and LSG back to back is a great example of this feeling so awkward and misplaced. With Moon Music, so far it's a lot less experimental and less punchy. It feels like the band is purposefully appealing to oldplayers by saying "it's the new Viva!" and "Eno is back" and not doing any Max Martin or big feature mentions in the marketing. But the risk of this gets to something the band itself has said. They've already done Parachutes, they've already done X&Y, they don't want to repeat themselves. With FLFIF and iAAM espescially, they are kind of repeating themselves in my opinion, but if the songs are good, I'm not sure if that's going to bother me.

yeah I agree, the instrumental is fantastic at least in the version I heard. The only major thing that connects every Coldplay era (when it sounds good) is Jonny's guitar and some other instrumental, whether it's cool drumming (LOST!, AOAL) great bass (Magic, Sparks) and more often than not, piano/acoustic guitar/synths (first five albums The Astronaut). The genre may change, the production may change, but if Jonny is present the songs are so tasty, and iAAM really soars in this regard. Fingers crossed the songs we haven't heard yet (Moon Song, Jupiter, Rainbow Emoji, final AML) have strong Jonny parts I think I'm going to really like this album.

Geez guys. Yes, you can have opinions of stuff being perfect or horrible, very true but no need to call out people on that and be rude. Reel it back for a hot sec, there's no winning on the internet. iAAM is really solid and excited to hear the high quality version. I agree with a lot of folks on here saying it's too short though and that lyrically it's not as good as Oldplay still. But I don't know, Moon Music is shaping up to be a very standard sounding Coldplay album, which perhaps is fitting for Album #10. There's something rather safe sounding about most ofthe songs now, it feels like the band wanted to reel back some of the experimental pomp of the last record and give fans something more straightforward. The comparisons of DAAHF are obvious but there's definitely a AHFOD/MOTS lyrical and production style as well.

It's definitely fake because clearly someone took at the existing leaked clips of songs and mashed them together into a supposed "Moon Music Preview." There's already confirmations that Jupiter changed to be more acoustic and the leaked jupiter snippets are likely no longer relevant. And since it seems fair game on this thread at this point to talk about the many leaks over the past 6 months or so, it appears that "Moon Song" was related to "The Only One" in the Notebook Edition prview. It feels concievable that the opening song is indeed an updated version of The Only One, which I'd have mixed feelings about because I like the song but also would prefer something more rock oriented to kick off the album. And yes, Earthling is definitely my favorite Colpdlay leak of all time. It's gorgeous and heartfelt and I guess it could be repurposed for "Angel Song" but I kind of have the feeling it's seperate. Fingers crossed it comes out one day.

Hey we're talking about the We Pray video released on Saturday which was directed by the same videographer that did E-Lo for Los Unidades.

In this day in age, you never know what's going to land and become a big Top 40 hit. Shaboozy has been dominating and Sabrina Carpenter, Post Malone and Chappell Roan are having immense years delving into a bunch of different genres. On top of that you have Tik Tok trends organically sprouting up bringing back older music often with a huge nostalgiac appetite -- like Sparks and Yellow show up a lot. I was hoping We Pray would have more of an impact on the charts given in some ways, it's the most "Viva La Vida" sounding song from the band with the strings and big drums. I appreciate the band promting a different style of music for a single and featuring great artists from across the world, it certainly did better than FLIFIL and I think it's been doing pretty well in the UK? At the end of the day, I think it's a catchy and good song but I can see why, espescially compared to other excellently produced pop music, it didn't grab people's attention. To some degree we have to contend with the fact that these are men in their mid 40's and that won't always have appeal to pop audiences. I'm maintaining my prediction that Good Feelings will chart Top 40 for a few weeks at least though. It's a groovy song.

Quick Review: It's a solid 8 or 9/10 for me. I think it's a super strong song with good production, solid mixing and a super catchy chorus and beat. Lil Simz sounds great per usual and has awesome lyrics, Burna Boy really adds a serious mood to it, the backing vocals throughout are really nice. The only thing that kind of bugs me is that once again, Jonny's guitar is very quiet in the mix and the live version featuring Elyanna on the final chorus and outro I think is way more pretty and powerful. I think a studio mix with Elyanna would be a near 10/10 for me so I'm kind of upset that this version made the album instead of hers. Not to crap on Chris but his vocals just don't hit as hard as the guests.

I'm excited too! Just a few hours. I really like the song compared to most on MOTS. It does have a Viva feel to it with the strings and drums so I'm excited to hear the final mixing to see if there's even more depth to the instruments. Lyically it's solid too, though I think the song may run the risk of some people feeling like it's a bit of privileged political drivel. What I mean by this is there's serious issues around the world right now including a genocide, and to just say "so we pray" that it will stop feels similar to the infamous 2000's "political" song "Waiting on the World to Change" by John Mayer because why wait, why not act? If there's real problems in the world you're addressing, why not call for action instead of just sitting there? I saw an IDOLS concert a few months ago and they probably screamed "Ceasefire Now!" after every song. Personally, I think Coldplay does try to code their messages for a broader audience and I think folks don't realize how much they support good causes, so it won't impact my enjoyment of the song, but I'm a bit worried about criticism.

I'm not surprised the Sigur Ros comparisons given the Moon Music cover has very Sigur Ros vibes. I'm excited to hear what that's like though it's still a Coldplay album so Good Feelings and FLIFL and We Pray are already not that vibe at all. And yes it's now confirmed that Angels Song is one of the tracks on Alien Hits Alien Radio.

So we know Aeterna and Good Feelings have a "disco" feel to them but the concern I have then is does the rest of the album also go for that vibe or is it totally different? Maybe Moon Music could have some sort of Groove or something in 🌈. It would just make the whole flow of the album better.

I don't know what Moon Music/Man on the Moon would sound like -- I mean heck it could be a big string instrumental or Jon Hopkins piece or something. I just have a feeling as an intro track it probably wouldn't be some big pop single and the only a to that would be some sort of alternative sounding song. Agreed it's a bad idea to get too hyped about iAAM like it's Viva again. To give Coldplay credit, they've never really repeated themselves album to album so I expect a different vibe. However, to be my own devil's advocate, MOTS was their most "vibeless" album so maybe Moon Music won't care about repeating past sounds as much.

I think the Chris & Dakota thing is unsubstantiated so I'd take it with a grain of salt, but I guess we'll see. I'm overall excited for this tracklist and intrigued as well about potential hidden tracks. I subscribe to the theory that Man in the Moon was combined with the Moon Music intro, which is really exciting because it means we'll have yet another stab at a more alt-rock type song opening up the album. It kind of reminds me of how on AHFOD we had no clue what the opener would sound like and it ended up being a really beloved song. FLFIL is a servicable track and We Pray is solid to me. If Jupiter and Good Feelings pair up nicely together, then I'm feeling really enthused about the rest of the album. Starting to sort of see the Viva comparisons but it's all going to come down to production and mixing. If they take all the air out of the songs with that thin Max Martin production -- like another guitar solo where we can't even hear the guitar, then RIP.

One of the intangibles that's fun about an album release even if we've heard teases we don't know how it's going to flow together in the studio version but I'm still being cautious about this given how MOTS did away with any sense of clear flow or pacing. I could see this tracklisting working though with a total album run time of somewhere around 43 minutes. Here's my guess and I'm basing some of my theories based on leaks I've heard so in case I'm right, don't click below.

This is interesting to me because I loved the Glastonbury version but felt that the final song may end up being too short or too overproduced. I was thinking about writing a message the other day saying "I hope we get a longer or even more distorted version of We Pray" So now that we're getting different flavors, I'm really excited to hear them. But I always say this -- it could lead to a bit of disappointment if the (?) version is like way better and cooler and it's not the actual one on the record.

Final tracklisting will be revealed eventually. I think Aeterna will probably be a b-side unless it's changed drastically just because the leaked versions were rather long and more alternative sounding.

I've definitely downgraded my cautious optimism to a wait and see attitude. I think Good Feelings could be my favorite Coldplay "pop" single since Adventure of a Lifetime -- it's really well produced and has an incredible groove. We Pray sounds really awesome as well, though it's pretty short and I worry the final production may cut out some of the guitar. I absolutely loved the version of One World they did way back when, and I hope that's a longer string track. But with all that said, there's also FLIFL and All My Love which are just middling to me, though we'll see if the All My Love has a better final version. I will say that people often debate production and mixing, which is a matter of taste. I'm more concerned about songwriting right now. Ever single song from the album we've heard so far (save One World) has had a "la la la la la" part. Each song has always been relatively short and very repetitive with unspecific lyrics with We Pray being the best so far. I worry that Moon Music is going to be too much of a mish mash of sounds, genres, features and lyrics, just like MOTS, to constitute an album vs a playlist. And the fact that they are releasing more demos is exciting, but also worrying because I can gaurentee each one of us will have our own song that we'd prefer be on the final tracklisting to make the album better. BUT we have to wait and see y'all. We've had maybe half the album's runtime released, so the gaps could really improve things with transitions and more interesting written songs.

They definitely soundchecked Good Feelings so it must be on Moon Music which makes me wonder if we'll get more Nile Rogers or just the one song? Also PLEASE GOD COLDPLAY please release Earthling. It's one of your best piano songs.