Coldplay - Viva La Vida
Coldplay - 4 albums in and still going strong - ‘Parachutes’ brought Coldplay to the forefont of the music scene back in 2000 and helped them to do something not really managed by a British band since Radiohead - Crack America.
With their second effort ‘A Rush Of Blood To The Head’ they pretty much exploded, bringing out classics left, right and center including ‘Clocks’ and ‘In My Place’, so when album three dropped using a ‘Clocks’ rip off in the form of ‘Speed Of Sound’ I shed a small tear. ‘X & Y’ as far as i’m concerned was not the best thing i’ve heard from Coldplay and I don’t think I was the only one.
Don’t get me wrong - there is some good stuff on ‘X&Y’, ‘Square One’ for example, a great track and was ideal as the opening track of their live shows back then, but the album just wasn’t that great as a package.
So, Album 4 is here and it’s already selling huge, it was bound to be, whether reviews were damning or not, it was always going to fly off the shelves, thankfully I haven’t anything particularly damning to say about ‘Viva La Vida Or Death And All His Friends’ as I think it’s a giant step forward for the band.
There was criticism regarding ‘X & Y’ having a lack of musical oomph, not really trying anything different in the way they had from ‘Parachutes’ to ‘A Rush…’ so in Chris Martins’ own words the rest of the guys in Coldplay ‘took back the music’ from Martin and did things their own way, and it shows.
The music is much more focused now, everything is much more experimental and really proves that Buckland, Champion and Berryman pull the musical strings, with Martin almost taking a backseat this time around compared to the almost ‘Martin Only’ tracks such as ‘Fix You’ on ‘X & Y’.
‘Life in Technicolor’ is an excellent start to the album, showing you straight from the get-go that these guys are trying something a little different, ‘Cemetries of London’ is also another great track with a wonderful, yet simple guitar solo from Buckland.
The album never lets up with my only dissapointment being ‘Yes’, ‘Yes’ just isn’t my cup of tea, not to worry however as straight after you have what, In my opinion is Coldplays best ever song in ‘Viva La Vida’, a great track, showing Martin has really matured as a lyricist and that musically the band are on top of their game.
The album ends where it started off looping with track 1 in the form of ‘The Escapist’ which, is probably my favourite track on the album and a great way to end the whole affair, at around 47 mins long, the album isn’t the longest, but there is a lot to say and a lot to prove in that time and they certainly achieved what they set out to do.
If you didn’t like Coldplay before, then nothing will make you change that fact here, but if you’re a fan, efforts like this only help to galvanise your faith in the huge British stars, more of the same please.
Rating: 9 out of 10 Beans
