Coldplay's new album: A measured view

Roger Dean that was the guy, brilliant stuff he did back in the 70s.  Cheers Graeme.

tonym I don't remember saying I hated or even disliked them personally, I don't know them.  I do dislike (or even hate) the drivel they have turned out over the last few years.  I actually bought their first album and liked it for a while and then went totally off it and it seems to me everything they have turned out since Parachutes has just been more of the same - but even more insipid!

The fact that they take themselves so seriously does not help either imo.

I don't have a dog so it is mathematically possible that they did kill my dog!  Mind you dogs are smelly 'orrible things, so I wouldn't hate Coldplay if they had been responsible for my dogless condition.

You're not the only one posting an opinion here Bill.

You can think that if you like, but for what it's worth I don't like the album. 

But I could not have made it, even if I had years and years to do so.

I could however write a smug, stupid, not actually useful, bandwagon-jumping review full of apostrophied swear words and insults, and it wouldn't take me very long.

I don't believe critics need to be able to perform at the thing that they are commenting on, but they do need to be able to understand it, and communicate their understanding in a meaningful way. Otherwise their reviews are valueless, and so therefore, are their opinions. There is nothing in that review that actually criticises the music, or even describes it really.

People who hate Coldplay are going to s****** and not buy the record. But they wouldn't have bought it anyway. People who don't hate Coldplay are going to regard the review (if they can be bothered to read it) as useless in determining whether they would or wouldn't like the record. Which is the point of a review.

Easy target. Badly shot at.

Wisdom is the acceptance that taste is subjective.

I read that it's the fastest selling record in history on some criteria or other (relative to what I can't remember). I think the reviewer is simply jealous. And it shows.

What has the world come to when the word  S N I G G E R gets edited out of a post by an automated system?

Richard, that is truly, awfully, absurdly ridiculous.

I tried to put S N I G G E R in my original post Rod, but also got it blanked out. Guess it's because it contains the "N" word, but it's a bit daft. I mean, suppose I lived in s****horpe?

(yep, edited that out too!)

Rod

Well said. I like my critics to describe/explain and write about the music, not just say good/bad and give it a star rating. i don't always agree with ptchforkmedia but in general their reviews are intresting to read.

Anyone can just slag off a piece of work

Mind you today The Guardian has a hilarious review of the Nicole Kidman movie 'Grace of Monaco'. Sounds an utter stinker!

Bruce

Do keep up .

G

Err.. yes Tony that had occurred to me, but you seem to be tarring us all with the same brush.  That's all.

Here, here.  Could not have put it better myself.  'Nuff said as far as I am concerned.

Cold, yes. Play definitely not.

And the elephant in the room is ...................

If previous Coldplay albums are anything to go by, the sound is mastered for the mp3 player and they sound (to continue the literary style of the review) f***ing awful.

No ta.

John.

I hope that, with effort, both of you might improve on this level of post.

I hope but I do not expect.

It's a lot safer to join in with general disapproval than expose something of yourself by saying what you like.

"It's a lot safer to join in with general disapproval than expose something of yourself by saying what you like."

What a pompous load of old toffee, I would never expose myself.

Besides, I often say on these forums what music I like. 

Rod, here's a challenge for you - try it. And, more importantly, be just as amusing.Go on...

I rather doubt you'll be able to, though. I think you'll find it a lot more difficult than it looks.

Do you think that when he spends his money, he "consciously decouples" from it?

How so? How does it show? And what is he supposed to be jealous of? Being a rich and famous person regarded by millions of people as a pretentious, whiney tit?

As I said earlier, the guy who wrote it is a friend of mine, and while I'm sure he wouldn't mind a bit of Martin & Co's money (who wouldn't?), David is a really, really fine (and often very funny) writer with a number of acclaimed books under his belt - and another tome (on Krautrock) due out in the summer.

He never took up your challenge Kevin, I wonder why?

To be fair, if I only bought music made by people who's public persona I liked (or even just fail to detest) I'd have to sell my Smiths albums for starters.

Bruce 

Actually, I've been out all day. Is that allowed?

I've re-read the 'review', which apparently isn't a review but is a joke.

I think I've stated why I don't think it succeeds as a review. It doesn't review the music for a start, and relies on ad hominem attacks on the singer and his wife/ex-wife whatever. I fail to see how these people being ghastly or worthy of ridicule is important to the music. All the more so when he has (to my ears) quite an irritating voice.

But, anyway, it's not a review, it's a joke. Apparently

I think it fails as a joke, too, to be honest.

On the criteria of brevity and originality mainly. Humour, of course, is in the eye of the beholder.

Personally I grew out of finding seas of swearing "the most amusing thing I've read in ages" when I was about 20, around the time I stopped reading Viz.

So, I can't help thinking that the Venn diagram of what you find amusing, and what I find amusing has at its overlapping heart an elipsoid of greater slenderness than either Gwyneth Paltrow's waist, or Chris Martin's popularity. Perhaps we should both take the Mista H test.

So it seems like a fairly futile exercise for me to try to replicate your friend's review. 

I think I'll derive more pleasure from answering Richard's question in the wine thread.

Cheers!

Rod

PS I really don't like the album.