No trouble for Coldplay
The band is celebrating 20 years together, but they remain one of the most divisive acts. James Hall explains how being unfashionable was the key to their success
Twenty years ago next Tuesday, four wide-eyed students in a band called Starfish played their first gig in the now-defunct Laurel Tree pub in Camden, London. Paying £4 on the door, around 115 people — mainly friends from University College London — watched the band, who had first rehearsed six days earlier. With a sound indebted to the melancholic-yet-uplifting indie rock of Jeff Buckley and Radiohead, Starfish played six songs, including the appallingly-titled ‘Ode To Deodorant’.
Within months, Starfish changed their name to Coldplay and wisely dropped the deodorant song. Four years later, they headlined Glastonbury and became one of the world’s biggest acts. To date, they have sold more than 70 million albums.
Two decades on from the Laurel Tree, how did these four unassuming individuals become a globestraddling phenomenon? And why, despite chart-topping albums, Hollywood lifestyles and a phenomenal live reputation, have the band never quite managed to shed the tag of being a bit straight and uncool, the aural equivalent of a zingy cup of herbal tea?
Back in the 90s, initial reaction among industry talent scouts — the A&R men — was mixed. Jon Chapman, the former Island and Virgin Records A&R manager, saw Coldplay at the Borderline in 1998 and recalls singer Chris Martin’s “nervous contagious enthusiasm”. A&R legend Mike Smith, who signed Blur and Arctic Monkeys, said recently that he found Martin “quite annoying” the same year. Even Dan Keeling, Parlophone’s A&R man, who signed Coldplay in April 1999, was initially “unimpressed” when he saw them in 1998 in Soho.
“There were 30 people there,” Keeling says. “The band looked very studenty — Chris was wearing a grey jumper that was three sizes too big. A couple of members wore stonewashed denim. Chris was handing out Curly Wurlys and I remember thinking ‘Oh God, I’m not sure about that’. They hadn’t nailed their sound. Far from it. So I left. They were just another band.”
But when Keeling saw them in early 1999, they’d vastly improved. He particularly remembers a “brilliant” Buckley-esque song called ‘Bigger Stronger’. “I couldn’t believe they’d come on so much,” he says.
Great songs drove Coldplay’s success. Crucially, the band understood dynamics — songs often built to a rousing singalong climax. A glorious soaring chorus made ‘Yellow’ a major hit in 2000. The softer follow-up, ‘Trouble’, was equally appealing. Keith Wozencroft, then managing director of Parlophone, says initial sales expectations for their debut album Parachutes were modest.
“Breaking an artist was deemed a gold record, so 100,000 sales. If you get a band past that, you’d be really happy,” he says. Parachutes sold 8.5 million. Their second album, 2002’s
A Rush Of Blood To The Head, sold
12 million copies. Their third,
2005’s X&Y, sold 20 million.
In five years, Coldplay went from popular to big to huge.
Admittedly there were other factors at play in the band’s journey. For a start, there was the fortunate timing. Coldplay were signed in an “in between” phase in music: specifically, the four-year window between Britpop’s final retro swagger in 1997 (very un-Coldplay) and the garage rock revival spearheaded by The Strokes in 2001.
But by never being part of a fashionable movement in the first place, Coldplay have — almost by definition — never been out of fashion. Their very ‘inbetweenness’ has become part of their success story.
They were polite and worked hard, which audiences appreciated. Martin spent early gigs apologising — it was “the Hugh Grant, English thing”, Keeling says — and his teetotal lifestyle let him focus on songwriting, thus creating a virtuous circle. Sensible business decisions — such as equally splitting royalties and investing in the company behind the flashing wristbands they give out at shows — gave the band ballast.
This self-effacing charm helped them break the US almost immediately. They won their first Grammy in 2002 for Parachutes.
Of course, they have attracted criticism, too. Creation boss Alan McGee famously called their output “bed-wetters’ music”. But, following the horrors of 9/11, the world craved ‘safe’ and Coldplay’s music fitted the bill perfectly. The band were writing their second album when the attacks happened. In dark times, who could fail to be soothed by the sonic balm of 2005’s ‘Fix You’? Coldplay became the world’s comfort blanket: warm and reassuring. When Glastonbury relaunched in 2002 with a safe new £1m super-fence and softer vibe, who did Michael Eavis choose to headline?
One thing is for sure — the band has never been cool or edgy. Too often they’ve gifted detractors reasons to sneer: the Bono-esque moralising about ending poverty, the Les Misérables-lite costumes for ‘Viva La Vida’, the gawkiness, the smuglyworded “conscious uncoupling” when Martin separated from Gwyneth Paltrow, and EMI’s share price plummeting in 2005 due to the band’s album being delayed, for example.
“They certainly weren’t rock ’n’ roll,” Keeling concedes. “I mean, handing out Curly Wurlys is not like Mick and Keef, is it, strutting their stuff in the 70s?”
People love to hate them, but it’s hard not to be impressed and moved when seeing them perform. A Coldplay show is a riot of colour and communal positivity. Such is the level of production that their gigs end with rolling credits. Coldplay’s live prowess has coincided with a cultural shift: as physical music sales decline, people will shell out for visceral experiences. Their sound has also moved with the times, becoming more pop and mainstream and less guitar-led. In 2012 they duetted with Rihanna (left) and, two years later, worked with Avicii, the dance music producer. Some argue this move has diluted any gravitas.
But perhaps keeping things vague and shiny is also a way of keeping their appeal broad and their momentum going. In this sense, 20 years on, Coldplay seem to be playing an astute long game that sums up modern music. They know that surviving as a band means adapting to shifting musical tastes. And they know that the future lies in immersive live music. And if this means occasionally substituting heart for colour, and replacing vulnerability with spectacle, then it’s a price they seem willing to pay.