Coldplay and the downfall of humanity
Coldplay has me concerned for the future of mankind.
It’s not that I hate the band. In fact, I quite like a lot of their music. What worries me is the way the world views Coldplay: It’s as if they’re big-time British rockers and the sound of the generation, the same way Oasis was in the 1990s and U2 was in the 1980s.
If that’s true, humanity has a lot less to look forward to than I’d like to believe. Coldplay is dreary, whiny rock with a spacey ambiance and a solemn quietude. They’re a band with niche sound, not a sweeping melodic power to steal the imagination of a generation.
I’ve had several friends talk about Coldplay shows with a reverence that seems like it should be reserved for bigger, better bands. I like Clocks and all, but does it really have the tremendous impact that a song like, say, Sunday Bloody Sunday does? No, it doesn’t. Not by a long shot.
At least the 1990s had some attitude. The kids from my generation may have been as pathetic as kids today, but at least we wanted to be tough and credible. “I was looking for some action / but all I found were cigarettes and alcohol” sang Oasis in one of the generation-defining numbers off of a generation-defining album. It has a stomp that Coldplay is terrified to even approach.
Compare that to: “Confusion never stops / closing walls and ticking clocks.” When I imagine someone singing Clocks, he’s crying in his bed. He’s sad because he doesn’t know why he’s crying in his bed, but he knows he needs to. When I imagine someone singing Cigarettes and Alcohol, he’s beating up the person singing Clocks.
I’m not saying I want a generation of thugs, but I do want a generation with some confidence. I want a generation that knows what rock and roll is. When you hold up Coldplay as the great British arena rock band of the era, it’s depressing to anyone who knows what a band like that should really sound like.
What especially bothers me is that Coldplay kept the same gray sound for three albums in a row, except the second and third of those had less energy than the first one did; The Professor has a more intricate, developed sound but it lacks the spark that Yellow had. It’s as if detached complacency and vague worrying are the band’s major themes.
Of course, there’s always that fourth album, Viva La Vida. Everybody loves Viva La Vida because Coldplay finally made an album with the slightest buoyancy to it. Please: this is what X&Y or A Rush of Blood to the Head should have sounded like. The world handed Coldplay the arena rock throne, no questions asked, but Chris Martin still wept into his pillow for two more albums.
Viva La Vida is far from a bad album, but it’s beyond overhyped. The album is not a great leap forward. It’s still Coldplay. The dreary, spacey sound has entered a bit back into the atmosphere, but it’s still too gray.
Don’t get me wrong: I don’t hate Coldplay, not by a long shot. In fact, I’d even say I love a few of their songs. I’d be happy to see them live. But I accept them for what they are: A decent band with a unique sound that becomes tiresome fast.
They’re not the sound of the decade. At least I hope they’re not. If so, in about twelve years, a bunch of patsies who don’t know what British rock really sounds like are going to be having kids and entering the workforce. That’s like the first sign of the apocalypse according to the Book of Revelation, or something.
August 30th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
“You know how I know you’re gay? You like Coldplay”