One record at a time: 63. Coldplay - Everyday Life

I bought "Everyday Life" when it was released in 2019 in the form of this double silver vinyl that came with a pin badge. On receipt of my purchase I downloaded the digital files and listened to them precisely once. I haven't listened to album since and the vinyl remains mint and unplayed.

Whilst reviewing Coldplay's previous album I had no idea what one of the tracks was supposed to be. Well, this is an album full of tracks that I have no idea what they are supposed to be.

I have listened to the digital files again for this post but I can find nothing worthy of comment and see no reason to ever open the vinyl. Absolutely nothing happens on this record and it is devoid of any interest for lovers of electronic music. You'll be unsurprised to hear I didn't buy follow up "Music of the Spheres". No more Coldplay for me. 0/5

One record at a time: 62. Coldplay - A Head Full of Dreams

Having quite enjoyed "Ghost Stories" I was left susceptible to the relentless promotion for the follow up album "A Head Full of Dreams" a year later.  As a result, I purchased this double, coloured, limited edition vinyl when it was released in 2015.

The title track is the opening cut and it is the usual high quality, uplifting anthem we have come to expect from Coldplay. They must have written this and sat back knowing they had an instant hit. "Birds" always sounds like its about to segue into "Don't Get Me Wrong" by The Pretenders and unfortunately I'm not a fan of either song. Beyoncé guests on the catchy "Hymn for the Weekend" which closes the first side of the record.

"Everglow" is one of those reflective and maudlin songs that doesn't have enough to interest me despite some electronic drums. Chris's ex-wife features on backing vocals for this track leading me to understand why some people criticise Coldplay as "bringing baggage" that distracts from the music.

Things kick up a gear with "Adventure of a Lifetime" which feels like a track where producers StarGate finally got to flex their muscles. "Fun" is an interesting track but I have no idea what "Kaleidoscope" is meant to be. "Army of One" sounds like StarGate were left alone with ProTools whilst the band went down to the pub - and that isn't necessarily a bad thing. The only other track of note is "Up&Up" which supposedly features Noel Gallagher on guitar. What Noel was able to contribute that Jon or a session musician couldn't muster I'm not sure. The annoying guitar solo at the end certainly sounds as irritating as Oasis, so maybe it was that. Three good songs do not an album make. 2/5

One record at a time: 61. Coldplay - Ghost Stories

Love them or loathe them, you can't ignore Coldplay. As I remember this album got quite a slating in the press when it was released. The review in The Quietus was so childish and scolding that I deleted their URL from my bookmarks and have never returned. This is not to say I am a massive Coldplay fan, but I won't dismiss an entire album just because some of the lyrics reference the breakdown of the singer's relationship.

This is the standard European 180g vinyl and, as an Optimal Media pressing, it sounds very good indeed. This is another purchase that stems from the beginning of an era when I stopped buying CDs in preference to vinyl. I have even resisted the temptation top buy a second hand CD of this album in a charity shop for £1 recently.

The first track "Always In My Head" is a nice atmospheric opening that sets the tone for the rest of the album. Whilst standout track "Magic" may have a driving electronic beat, it retains the dream pop feeling and is simply a great tune. "Ink" is a bit more disappointing and sounds like a reject from a Sting album. The next track features beats by Timbaland and an interval that I've heard elsewhere; but I quite can't place it. Still its better than appropriating a Kraftwerk melody. Side one finishes with "Midnight" which is quite a haunting track that slowly emerges from its crystallise into a beautiful piece of electronic music.

I regard the b-side of this album as a bit of a disappointment. "Another's Arms" has the first lyric that made me cringe a little and "Oceans" is an acoustic guitar driven song that, despite a sprinkling of electronica, doesn't ever really get started. The only real highlight on the flip side is the ubiquitous "A Sky Full of Stars". This songs has an anthemic chorus and despite being produced by Avici, it retains enough rock stylings to keep the mainstream happy. The last track is labelled as "O" on the sleeve and seems to be two songs, "Fly On" and "O" with two minutes of silence inserted between them. Despite a promising start, I always feel a little let down at the end of this album. If the second side was as good as the first, this would have been an amazing collection of songs. 3/5

LsstFM listening map

As an avid user of LastFM and its 'scrobbling' software I am always interested in statistics related to my listening habits. Recently I have been investigating various scripts and BBCode utilities that can be used to display a range of statistics in your LastFM profile.

Of all the utilities to be found on the web, I was drawn most strongly to the work of Anthony Liekens. Anthony’s website offers the opportunity to create an interactive map showing links between the artists and genre’s you listen to. Once you enter your username the website retrieves your information and begins to create a map on screen. The map shifts in response to the data by moving unrelated tags apart and creating a cluster of related genre’s and artists.

I have to say that the majority of the items on my personal map were not a great surprise: 80’s, electronic, and synth-pop are very prominent tags which link strongly to the majority of the music I listen to. The map also shows a large number of artists in the EMB/Industrial/Future Pop genre with a scattering of ‘new wave’ artists thrown in for good measure. I was pleased to note the eclectic nature of my musical taste was represented with the ‘classical’ tag in evidence. This isolated cluster linked to music by Beethoven, Wendy Carlos and Philip Glass et al.

However, what did catch my eye was the revolting tag of ‘indie’. You see ‘indie’ music is something of an anathema to me. I hate both he tag and the music. Just mention the word ‘indie’ and it brings me out in a cold sweat. Note that the rock area of my map is fairly isolated and being shoved off to the corner by the sheer volume of ‘synth-pop’ and ‘emb’ bands.

It seems I am not as prejudiced as I think. Both Coldplay and the Longpigs were represented along with artists tagged with ‘prog-rock’ and ‘brit pop’. For a dedicated enthusiast of electronic music I felt as if I had let myself down slightly.

Yet on closer examination, the majority of the bands included are in my library because they use synthesizers as part of their sound. Yes is one example of a group I began to listen to as the minimoog performances of Mr Rick Wakeman are something wonderful to behold. Coldplay used tunes written by Kraftwerk and utilise many electronic instruments. In his solo work Ian Brown has created some fantastic music utilising a mixture of synthesizers and conventional rock instruments.

I have no excuse for the Rolling Stones. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.