Personally, right out of the gate, it is impossible to NOT evolve. Period. The more years of life experience you add to your calendar the more you evolve. It just happens, you can stay in Neverland. No matter how many lawns you grow or clouds you yell at.
So for me and the evolution of a musical artist it is less about the evolution and more about the voice. Does it feel authentic? Does it feel true to the artist at the core?
This is all swirling around in my head on a Saturday in the twilight because, well, I admit it, I got serious FOMO- Correction I didn’t get FOMO, there is no fear anymore, I actually missed out seeing Coldplay at the end of May. And I am by no means a Coldplay fan. I think I know maybe 5 songs. But the songs I know- well they smash that internal button I have in me that lights up all my chromosomes and makes me a music fan. Plus I saw pictures of the stage show… NEON LIGHTS! And lots of them. I have a not so mild obsession with neon lights.
Anyway, my last ditch day of efforts with ticket-fu that usually work failed mainly because I didn’t have the energy to go through two hours of train rides to Palo Alto from Berkeley at such short notice. However, that FOMO sent me to Coldplay reddit threads. Being an outsider in fandoms is kind a fun way to examine music, it’s like a Jane Goodall studying a tribe of chimps.
I know they are the biggest band in the world now. I did not however realize just how much the band changed some people’s lives in the 2000s. I can’t say I am surprised. That is what the our favorite music does to us. And it seems especially true if that music hit you at the same time you hit puberty. While it changed lives, I guess I only ever really heard the public painted a perception of them as the punching bag band (pop’s Nickleback cousin). Not that I really had any opinion, which is odd because I LOATHE hype. And they had HYPE… And that usually makes me start to convulse and want everybody to just CALM the fuck down.
But again maybe being the punching bag, it tempered that demon in me.
Whatever the case, being on Coldplay threads it quickly became apparent there was a line drawn somewhere around Mylo Xyloto from 2011 that many fans declared Coldplay had “sold out” or “gone too pop” etc. They did a song with Rhianna! Yikes. Again, not a fan only know about five songs.
But reading the frustrated opinions of OG fans crying they miss “old Coldplay” mixed with the exasperated eye rolls of others, “This topic again” or “Bands evolve get over it” made me instantly think of AC/DC.
The joke is that AC/DC have eighteen albums and one song. Also, Angus Young was asked once why he plays the same three cords over and over and he responded, “Because those are the three that work.” No band, not even The Rolling Stones or Kiss stayed in one lane so strongly their entire career Aa drastic change in the lead singer! And they still sold out stadiums and arenas. All with one song and VERY little theatrics.
I like AC/DC. I am by no means a huge super fan. But they did what they did better than most and never messed with formula.
Coldplay it’s seems from comments didn’t just mess with the formula, they lost their voice in the process. It is one thing to evolve, like say The Beatles on every album since Hard Days Night it’s another to try out knew things but discard much of the authenticity of voice. Heck, Joni Mitchell did wildly different types of albums in her career but it was all undeniably Joni.
To go back to the chimps for a moment. We humans evolved from chimps. At some point on that line we stopped being chimps. So I could see why many Coldplay fans might not like the new Coldplay because for them it evolved so munch it is no longer the band that changed their life.
This is also why country fans like myself blast bro-country and much of the mainstream country realm of the past 12-15 years it evolved so much it is just factually no longer country music no matter how good the songs might be. But the evolution cliché never died so now people in the mainstream who never really listened to country music think these pop songs are country music as long as there is banjo or “storytelling” and most importnatly they are told it is country.
Likewise people who came to Coldplay with the more pop oriented later records think THIS is Coldplay.
But for the OG fans doing a song with Rhianna during peak Rhianna… Eh…. Not bad per se but is it Coldplay? To say nothing of more recent song with BTS during peak BTS & K-pop. Madonna did a song with Britney Speares and later Justin Timberlake and even latr Nicki Minaj at all their peaks and eh… they were hits… but eh… That kinda felt like Madonna starting to follow trends not set them as she had done through the 80s and 90s.
One of my favorite bands The Police maintained their voice until they could not anymore and quit. Read about that here.
And they quit at their commercial peak! Much like The Beatles. And Sting had his solo career, which sounds NOTHING like the Police. I like some stuff more than other stuff in it but even in his solo work while the production might have evolved in a direction I was not a fan of, the VOICE of Sting remained. And because of the band splitting in 1984 I don’t have to have that whole The Police were better in the beginning conversation… they more or less stayed consistent in sound and voice outside two or three songs.
But back to Coldplay. What kicked off me wanting to see Coldplay at all was because on my MP3 player there was some compilation of random pop hits that had, “A Sky Full Of Stars” a monster worldwide hit.
I thought WTF is Coldplay doing on here? Not in a judgmental way but in a, I don’t have any Coldplay so how did this get here? Well I quickly learned,“A Sky Full Of Stars” is an arena BANGER and falls dead center of the target for the kind of dance bangers that make me euphoric. But I think this is less due to Coldplay and largely due to the production from Aviccii. But even with arena worthy status, lyrically it is pretty vapid which, sadly, tends to happen with dance bangers.
‘Cause you’re a sky, ’cause you’re a sky full of stars
I’m gonna give you my heart
‘Cause you’re a sky, ’cause you’re a sky full of stars
‘Cause you light up the path
I don’t care, go on and tear me apart
I don’t care if you do, ooh-ooh, ooh
‘Cause in a sky, ’cause in a sky full of stars
I think I saw you
But much like the equally lyrically empty, “Hard Days Night”:
It’s been a hard day’s night,
And I’ve been working like a dog.
It’s been a hard day’s night,
I should be sleeping like a log.
But when I get home to you,
I find the things that you do
Will make me feel alright.
With the right production the song gets elevated to something more than the individual pieces might suggest. That said The Beatles were all in their early twenties when that song an album came out. Chris Martin and Coldplay were in their thirties when “A Sky Full Of Stars” landed and Martin isn’t top billed on the song-writing credits (that is Avicci).
Also, “A Sky Full Of Stars” came at the peak of EDM stadium bangers hitting the charts. This is the kind of song the mainstream public was eating up at the time. I missed this song on the first round, despite it falling perfectly into my dance banger zone. Ha! I must’ve been off in New Wave land or french Ye-Ye (which had it’s own assembly line cliché problems). Also I NEVER boarded the Rhianna train… I just do not get her appeal. Anyway, in 2025 randomly having that song blast in my ears as I walked down the street it hit all the right buttons in me. I felt a sense of joy that almost made me cry. It was another revitalizing shot of music in this 2025 world most people find to be pretty dour.
So that got me thinking about what other Coldplay songs I know, and it turns out I don’t know that many, which might stun people since they have a HUGE catalog of hits that are pop and rock standards at this point. I think at one point I thought, “Yellow” was an Oasis song. Ha!
But I knew, “Clocks”, “Speed Of Sound”, and “Viva La Vida” from radio. I also knew “Fix You” from the 2007 documentary Young At Heart about an elderly choir singing pop hits (see that film it is SO heartwarming). And this in turn got me thinking about where I was when those early Coldplay hits came out and how much trouble I was in then emotionally and in other ways.
So even though I was not a fan, those songs speak to a specific time in my life and hit that nostalgia button being in my mid twenties. So when comparing a song like “Clocks” or “Yellow” to “A Sky Full Of Stars”… Being hyperbolic I would say objectively the former are better than the later for a whole host of reasons. And maybe I’ll review them properly later. But the big one is I do know dance/club music and at the time everyone wanted a big room/stage festival dance hit. And “A Sky Full Of Stars” is the only Coldplay song to go #1 on the dance charts. But U2 has also gone #1 on the dance charts so, it’s nothing new for rock bands adding big dance beats to some songs.
But “A Sky Full Of Stars”, as I said is not deep lyrically and it definitely feels on the nose with the pop bangers of the time that MANY people were cashing on in. Musically, it is not super interesting or complex. But so what? We have a whole lot of blues and country that are also not musically complex or even interesting in terms of playing or production but are stellar. Complex after all does not mean better, it just means complex no matter how much you LOVE Steely Dan or Mozart.
So this comes back to the voice. And maybe Coldplay lost their voice. Maybe they evolved so much they are no longer Coldplay. I don’t know I’d have to go through the catalog. But I could see how fans would think, “A Sky Full Of Stars” on it’s surface feels like a calculated cash grab. And “My Universe” with BTS feels even more so. I LOVE “A Sky Full Of Stars”. I like “My Universe” a lot less. But I am coming to to one song well after it peaked on the charts. Also this is where people start shouting “bands evolve” or “They have to change styles to stay relevant”.
Again, not a Coldplay super fan, but my counter argument to this is one that I have said of musicians and music fans as a whole… we have collectively lowered our standards in what we expect in mainstream music. What Coldplay fans accepted as top tier work in the beginning- Most gradually just accepted, what many claim is, lesser later work as if, “It’s better than nothing…” Sure they got more fans maybe, I don’t know they were pretty big by Viva La Vida. But the new fans are irrelevant here. It is older fans that keep showing up and buying albums and going to shows and just accepting it as “evolution” maybe because they don’t want to think their favorite act has lowered their bar a bit.
Also in threads I have seen complaints about the set lists and surprise songs favoring the new music. One of the more surprising common comments it that Chris Martin often can’t remember the lyrics to his own songs! So they don’t do as much variety in the acoustic portions or songs “chosen by fans”. Well, if this is true it is a prime example of fans lowering the standards. I saw the Dance Hall Crashers reunion show. They had not played live in over twenty years. 25 songs they new every word. And the new every word on the 2nd night with a slightly different set list. I assume because they practiced. Now maybe Coldpay is so huge and so far removed from the trenches that they feel “too big too fail”. So feel they can let it slip. But Bruce Springsteen and his band seem to have no trouble remembering the lyrics and music to all his songs and song of hundreds of other artists. But even if you can’t remember the lyrics, dude… you can use lyrics on a screen or hell even let the fans help you sing it. Soul legend Irma Thomas come on stage with a giant tome of lyrics to every song she every recorded on a music stand. So if some fan yells out for a deep cut she just flips to the page and the band leans into it.
The complaint about focusing on the newer music and catering to the new fans is tricky. It is basically playing the “songs people know”. Music acts what to make new music and move forward. They want fans to come along and hear them live. Why tour for a new album if you are just going to play the same songs you did last tour? I get it. And I do wish live shows on the whole were more varied with set-lists. Conversely, if you play mostly the new stuff live because it’s the “songs people know” they only hear those songs and thus will only know those songs. We have a similar problem in the DJ world at clubs. Play the songs people know otherwise you will have an empty dance floor yet people only know the songs you play.
Also as a side note to this issue: I want to remind those people who go to concerts or clubs and say, “I don’t know this song” and leave the floor. Every song you know- Every single one- At some point in your life was a song you did not know. So ask yourself where and when did you suddenly become so risk averse to songs you “don’t know”?
Anyway, I understand the balancing act of set lists. I saw Elton John’s final tour and I personally would have died a complete life if he had played, “Mellow” from Honky Chateau or Blessed from , “Made In England” but then he has to leave out something… and he already most dropped most of his 80s work and played no 90s material that tour. Coincidentally, the 80s and 90s was when many people felt like Elton John had lowered his standards musically.
Two weeks ago I saw Allison Russell with her Rainbow Coallition (an all female backing band). Allison sings and plays banjo & clarinet. And for two hours she turned The Filmmore it a pagan moon goddess sweat show strutting around the stage, belting, hopping…. She even went into the audience and got down dancing AND played clarinet! All this non stop action and yeah she ran out of breath a couple times… but she took time to talk and catch her breath. Did I mention the dancing AND playing clarinet?
Point being I have seen a drastic increase over the last ten years of music fans making LOTS of excuses for musicians ESPECIALLY arena acts with the most expensive tickets and biggest budgets (and the most (no 9 to 5) free time to practice, phoning it in. Excuses for things backing tracks or lip-syching because- guys- dancing and singing together is HARD. Or any number of things on tour or in studio.
Meanwhile people like Alison Russell or Muna or Dance Hall Crashers who I mentioned earlier just show up with a band and mics and torch the venue. DCH review here.
If you think dancing and singing at the same time is hard, try playing Clarinet while strutting on stage or playing a sax for two hours straight *Candy Dulfer now enters the chat* or doing hula hoop while singing an entire song and introducing the band *Grace Jones now enters the chat* or taking audience requests for songs you didn’t even record and dishing them out with a full band *Bruce Springsteen reenters the chat*
Hell, Elton John on his final tour was just him and the band with one jumbo tron and some lights.
So what I am seeing time and again more and more is the word “evolution” being thrown around to excuse the lowering of standards in the mainstream music and the live show experience. It is one thing to venture off into modern or different sounds like David Byrne or Björk or Bowie it is a whole other thing to do so but negate the high quality that drew people to you in the first place. To say nothing of forgetting your own lyrics.
I saw Pet Shop Boys a few years back at the Fox and Neil Tennant LIP-SYNCED the wrong words to his own song! That definitely soured my experience. Meanwhile Tori Amos at the Paramount whipped out Sinead O’Connor’s, “Three Babies” because the woman had passed the day before. I’ve see one of those acts more than once and I’ll let you figure out which one.
Forgetting lyrics can be a cute real moment but if it happens regularly… to me that is inexcusable. If thespians can do sometimes 7 shows a week of a full two hour play Chris Martin can memorize his own lyrics.
“A Sky Full Of Stars”, frankly could’ve been written by any major pop songwriter. What about those lyrics are distinctly Coldplay? At least Swift, even on her lesser efforts, you can sort tell it is a Swift lyric because she has a distinct writing style. Even a pop banger like “Style” has distinct Swift touches in word choices and, “All Too Well” definitely didn’t come from anybody other than Swift.
And to get back to AC/DC despite the changes that occurred when original singer Bon Scott died somehow AC/DC became even MORE AC/DC and they managed to avoid veering into glam metal like Heart and Alice Cooper did in the 80s. You know an AC/DC song the moment it hits even if it is one you’ve never heard before. As an example, when I first heard the song “If You Want Blood (You Got It).” by The Bloody Jug Band I thought:
1. This song kicks ass
2. This sounds like an AC/DC Song
and THAT song is cover of an AC/DC song. That’s how definitive AC/DC sounds like AC/DC.
Aside from a lowering of our collective standards. I also think many acts in the mainstream have bought into the whole notion of every album must now be it’s own era and that one can never repeat an era. This was lead by people like Katy Perry, Swift, and Beyoncé and their fans. Bleech…
I think too many acts get caught up in having eras and the music suffers because it all has to fit some larger narrative and connect to the imagery and the roll out and the lore… Some people are good at making distinct eras others not so much. More importantly though, Michael Jackson just dropped Thriller on everybody in 1983. Madonna just dropped Ray Of Light on Everyone in 1998. They became eras after the fact. They were not trying to create an era at the outset.
Dua Lipa dropped Future Nostalgia a straight disco album that aspired to be nothing more than an album of disco bangers. It didn’t have lore or Easter eggs it just wanted to make you dance. And while I do think our dance anthems should also be held to higher standards in all areas. Especially when you’ve had people like; Stevie Wonder, Janet Jackson, Earth Wind And Fire or Prince in the game in the game. I can let dance bangers slide a little more than acts that have presented themselves as something with more substance and “authenticity”. It’s why I think, “Shake It Off” was a LOW bar for Swift because she had proven herself to have higher standards lyrically than that well before 1989 became a monster album.
I think Gaga overall has maintained consistency of voice while evolving and even if fans will argue over her distinct “eras” but overall I think she has really had one era the, “Gaga era”, meaning her entire career. Yes she dipped into jazz standards for a minute but her proper Gaga albums have always been Gaga albums they didn’t feel like Avicci featuring Coldplay or Calvin Harris featuring Rhianna. It was after all, “Telephone (feat. Beyonce)”.
Part of the reason I think the masses have lowered their standards in the mainstream is frankly they are exhausted with the fight for quality in all areas of life. And many don’t even know where to look for it and many have just raised the white flag of surrender… Corporate owns most major radio stations across the US. Livenation owns almost every major venue and thus people left to to deal with ticketbastard and scalpers if they want to see their favorite big acts live. So people have just resigned themselves to paying upwards of $300 for a show that on the surface is shiny and sparkly and “Oooo…” but when you scratch the surface… well what is really there.
Also I think spotify and youtube, with it’s every song all the time and the algorithms sending you in a circle have just made people more complacent and lazy as listeners. There is no active choice in the songs or albums it is auto pilot. Also, there is so much music out their to experience that it is overwhelming so you go with the brand name you know just to be safe.
To me this is so ironic because listening to and exploring new music has never been cheaper to do!
Before streaming it was a risk when laying down $15-20 of your teen job money on an album that might suck. Now you know what you are getting before you ever pay a single cent. I truly believe that lack of risk taking from the music listeners has resulted in the mainstream music taking less risks and it all sounding like a weird monogenre.
Some comments on Coldplay threads and even threads for Swift or other big acts have something to effect of, “I would love for them to do a tour with just a band on stage and none of the extra stuff”.
The response is usually something like, “People expect more at a stadium show” or, “If I am paying that much money I want more than just a band.”
My response to that is two words, “Live Aid” or one word “Woodstock”. But seriously, go watch Live Aid. It is just bands on stage and a few jumbo trons. Queen had probably the most iconic set of the whole show and they played during the early part of the day. And the audience was going crazy singing along to, “Radio Ga Ga” or even at the Freddie Mercury tribute concert George Michael got that HUGE ass arena to sing-a-long to “Somebody To Love” without dancing sharks.
Speaking of dancing Sharks the Superbowl half-time show is another great example where you can compare spectacle over substance. Prince is hailed as the greatest half-time show ever. No sharks, no dudes dressed as gladiators, no platforms descending from the ceiling and the only formation was Prince and his band in the rain.
Times change… yadda yadda… evolution… yadda yadda. All that starts to sound like buzzwords people use to make themselves feel better about the overall lower quality mainstream music and live shows they have rolled over and accepted. I have argued all that extra stuff on stage often is there to make up for what is lacking in the music. Or that maybe the big Arena shows have been bloated with the musical version of high fructose corn syrup. I do wonder if Beyoncé could do a full concert like Tina Turner used to do in the 80s. Some flashy lights, a few dancers and the tight band but really just Tina Turner being a consummate badass.
“The young people look great on television. They’re youthful and have a lot of zip and energy, but when you see them live, they can only do about 20 minutes because they haven’t got the training to hold an audience for an hour and a half or so.” – Tony Bennett
If Elton John, Billy Joel, Stevie Nicks and others (usually acts who started touring prior to the 90s) can fill Stadiums with just a band what does that say about modern music acts.
Maybe older fans just grew up with the expectation you were just getting a live band and no fireworks. I saw Motörhead at a stadium. It was just Lemmy and Co. Same with The Rolling Stones at Candle Stick Park. And in the case of The Rolling Stones specifically, the audience were the backup dancers.
Now I am not against spectacle at all, I’ve seen Cirque Du Soleil a number of times but I go in expecting that AND I expect VERY high quality from them and they deliver it. It is a whole team of people who have basically perfected a well oiled machine of acrobatics, clowns, and LIVE music.
And as I said I am SERIOUSLY despondent I missed Coldplay the stage design looks AMAZING. I am still trying to find someway to go, even it means flying elsewhere. But then I remind myself every time I do see a Stadium or arena act I am underwhelmed by the experience even when I get last minute cheap seats. The energy of arena shows just seem to dissipate out in to ether because it’s all so far away even when you are more or less up close. That and seats also get in the way of dancing and connecting with others.
So I find myself at this 3AM hour wondering why I am feeling like a missed out. What is about, “A Sky Full Of Stars” that has gotten into my blood stream that makes me want to see Coldplay so badly? What is it about the few songs I know from past years that has added to this desire?
I think for me to avoid disappointment at shows of this size I’d need to be on the floor with room to properly dance and with a band right in my face so I can’t escape them. Otherwise were I to go, would I be disappointed once again at the live concert experience? Or maybe I’ve just seen too many shows, I saw Ray Charles with the SF Symphony in a Stadium. Again, no theatrics.
People are reporting the Music Of The Spheres tour is best live show they have ever seen. I’ve seen photos and I do LOVE the set design but from the outside looking in I think, “How many live shows have you actually seen then?”
I saw Southern Culture On The Skids at Slim’s in SF burn the place down and near the end of the show they played a song called, “8 Piece Box” while throwing actual fried chicken from an 8 piece box into the audience! Coldplay is not giving away free fried chicken! They are not giving anything away free. Also, I was asked to teach the cha-cha-cha by t he bassist at that Southern Culture On The Skids show.
Well… This turned into what feels like a sea of unfocused stream of consciousness. And right now I am thinking about neon lights again (no not the Kraftwerk song). I wanna see that giant Coldplay set with the planets! Ha! Maybe I’ll make a vacation out of it and go to London and see them there.
To try and steer this spaceship back to evolution… I guess for me evolution is inevitable but it is how an artist presents that evolution that matters. Do I feel it is a step up or a step down? And I think what many Coldplay fans seem to be expressing in not so much that they dislike the new “sound” but with that new sound came lower quality lyrics and less voice from the rest of the band as a whole. It evolved so much it is no longer Coldplay. And if you are somebody who was on the ground floor in the trenches with a band sometimes one can feel a betrayal of sorts when the band shifts away from what you championed so hard.
But there is a beauty in all this evolution talk that I never see anybody discuss on ANY music thread. And taking AC/DC and Coldplay as examples- AC/DC being the ones who mastered one thing to varying applause and Coldplay who stretched further experimented more to varying success.
I think we can agree both avenues are valid paths.
Now, leaving aside the fact that the back catalog you LOVE lives forever, whatever position you prefer when it comes to a music acts and evolution there is vast sky full of music new to you out there to discover.
So if you miss the old Coldplay sound, other bands abound that you might also like. And a brief reddit search turned up such acts as; Leaves, Echo and the Bunnymen, Keane, Travis, Bell X1, Frightened Rabbit…
And likewise if you are team evolution. Well again, a sky of treasures abounds for you to discover if you get bored with a bands sound.
The thought that just invaded my head and maybe was where this whole commentary was headed is- Don’t wrap you musical identity up in just one music act. Being a well rounded music fan is one of life’s great pleasures because you can traverse many spheres in public.
Also, as I said up top, evolution happens to us all and sometimes the musicians we love are on that ride with us and then we come to a crossroads and we have to part ways. After all my first music obsession was Paula Abdul.
We’re still friends but I eventually took paths that led me to albums like, Yes I Am by Melissa Etheridge, Loreena McKennit’s Book Of Secrets and in keeping with the pop-rock lane Diva by Annie Lennox. And I don’t need another Diva from Annie Lennox it’s right there waiting for me along with a sky full of new songs and artists that might change my life forever.
