My dislike of Coldplay is three-fold, like a holy trinity of tepid disdain. Their early records contain many songs that seem like they were written to play at the end of an episode of Scrubs. What bothered me about those albums is that you could sense the band wanting to go further into the songs, but lacking the courage to do so in case it rocked the boat too much. Occasionally something will come through; on 'Clocks' for example where the bass line that plays throughout the song became the melody of the outro. That's just damn clever and it works too.
Then is the banality of their mid-late career output, which is especially prevalent in the lyrics. It may be unfair of me to say that because I've checked out on the band. I've already decided I'm not going to like them. I'll give their albums the once over, as I do with all major releases; as I am doing with the new Wet Leg lp as I write these words. Maybe if I actually sat down with Coldplay's last album and listened to it repeatedly, then it would come into focus and I would like it, or at least understand why it exists.
Finally, there is frontman Chris Martin's graduation into Bono junior, as a kind of ambiguous ambassador for global goodwill where you are not quite sure who is pulling the strings. I don't think Martin is anywhere near as hypocritical, devious and downright duplicitous as the U2 frontman (whose music up until Zooropa I still enjoy) but, unless you are making a run for political power, I fail to see the wisdom in getting chummy with people who have shrouded agendas and blood figuratively dripping off their hands.
With all that said, Coldplay's fourth album – Viva La Vida (or Death and All Of His Friends) which they made in part with Brian Eno, is a masterpiece, like someone discovered a cache of previously unknown William Blake poems and then set them to music. There is an antiquated naivety and a superficial knowledge of the world in the lyrics which I find very atmospheric. I can imagine John Donne nodding his head in approval at the line (from Violet Hill) “Bury me in armour, when I'm dead and hit the ground, my nerves are poles that unfroze”.
I was disconcertingly high up a ladder yesterday evening, attending to some business on the roof. Whenever I climb anything now, I always think of your accident, which I am sure fills you with joy. Plus I come a hospital safety culture. I am always looking at what's in front of me and thinking 'What could go wrong here and how can I stop it from going wrong?' The thing is you never see everything; you can never anticipate everything. I was up this ladder, which I never like climbing, but once I'm up I'm okay. Below me there were flagstones. I was thinking, if the ladder slipped is there a good way for me to fall? Probably not.
My friend Cat never gave up hope. Life would knock her down and she'd get up, and she wasn't a stupid girl – far from it – but she never gave up hope. It was borderline saint-like behaviour. I've never seen anything like it.
This was excellent; thanks for posting the podcast. (Now I want to listen to more of the series.) I especially appreciated your comments about "everything happens for a reason" and the whole "inspiration" trope. It brings to mind Stella Young's famous video where she talks about "inspiration porn" that objectifies people with disabilities to make others feel better. A friend of mine who is in my field (visual disability and blindness) is losing her vision right now. She said "I'm really tired of people telling me that I'm just the perfect person for this to happen to. I want people to just listen and agree with me that this sucks."
So thank you again and again for your sharing your posts about your shitty accident and your struggles. If you inspire others, it's for your honesty. There's not enough of that in this world.
Excellent! A very interesting listen. Couldn’t agree more about ‘Everything happens for a reason’ nonsense. I feel this is also a way for people (yet again) to absolve themselves from responsibility. Also Coldplay! Terrible band!
My dislike of Coldplay is three-fold, like a holy trinity of tepid disdain. Their early records contain many songs that seem like they were written to play at the end of an episode of Scrubs. What bothered me about those albums is that you could sense the band wanting to go further into the songs, but lacking the courage to do so in case it rocked the boat too much. Occasionally something will come through; on 'Clocks' for example where the bass line that plays throughout the song became the melody of the outro. That's just damn clever and it works too.
Then is the banality of their mid-late career output, which is especially prevalent in the lyrics. It may be unfair of me to say that because I've checked out on the band. I've already decided I'm not going to like them. I'll give their albums the once over, as I do with all major releases; as I am doing with the new Wet Leg lp as I write these words. Maybe if I actually sat down with Coldplay's last album and listened to it repeatedly, then it would come into focus and I would like it, or at least understand why it exists.
Finally, there is frontman Chris Martin's graduation into Bono junior, as a kind of ambiguous ambassador for global goodwill where you are not quite sure who is pulling the strings. I don't think Martin is anywhere near as hypocritical, devious and downright duplicitous as the U2 frontman (whose music up until Zooropa I still enjoy) but, unless you are making a run for political power, I fail to see the wisdom in getting chummy with people who have shrouded agendas and blood figuratively dripping off their hands.
With all that said, Coldplay's fourth album – Viva La Vida (or Death and All Of His Friends) which they made in part with Brian Eno, is a masterpiece, like someone discovered a cache of previously unknown William Blake poems and then set them to music. There is an antiquated naivety and a superficial knowledge of the world in the lyrics which I find very atmospheric. I can imagine John Donne nodding his head in approval at the line (from Violet Hill) “Bury me in armour, when I'm dead and hit the ground, my nerves are poles that unfroze”.
I was disconcertingly high up a ladder yesterday evening, attending to some business on the roof. Whenever I climb anything now, I always think of your accident, which I am sure fills you with joy. Plus I come a hospital safety culture. I am always looking at what's in front of me and thinking 'What could go wrong here and how can I stop it from going wrong?' The thing is you never see everything; you can never anticipate everything. I was up this ladder, which I never like climbing, but once I'm up I'm okay. Below me there were flagstones. I was thinking, if the ladder slipped is there a good way for me to fall? Probably not.
My friend Cat never gave up hope. Life would knock her down and she'd get up, and she wasn't a stupid girl – far from it – but she never gave up hope. It was borderline saint-like behaviour. I've never seen anything like it.
This was excellent; thanks for posting the podcast. (Now I want to listen to more of the series.) I especially appreciated your comments about "everything happens for a reason" and the whole "inspiration" trope. It brings to mind Stella Young's famous video where she talks about "inspiration porn" that objectifies people with disabilities to make others feel better. A friend of mine who is in my field (visual disability and blindness) is losing her vision right now. She said "I'm really tired of people telling me that I'm just the perfect person for this to happen to. I want people to just listen and agree with me that this sucks."
So thank you again and again for your sharing your posts about your shitty accident and your struggles. If you inspire others, it's for your honesty. There's not enough of that in this world.
Excellent! A very interesting listen. Couldn’t agree more about ‘Everything happens for a reason’ nonsense. I feel this is also a way for people (yet again) to absolve themselves from responsibility. Also Coldplay! Terrible band!