After last night’s trauma of finding there was a Queen tribute act performing at our hotel, all has returned to normal here in Formentera. I say this mainly in jest, as you my loyal reader will know only too well, because while it’s a simple fact, at least it is to me, that Queen are the worst band ever – it’s not even close – we all like different things. I suspect that people who love Bohemian Rhapsody are the very same folk who find Mrs Brown’s Boys hilariously funny and swear by the newspaper columns of Richard Littlejohn. Still, each to their own.
I suspect that if yer actual Queen, with a reincarnated Freddie Mercury, were to tour this summer, I would be the only person in the UK who wouldn’t pay to see them. In fact, I wouldn’t go to see them if I was paid to, but enough Queen bashing. Let’s get onto Coldplay.
I am definitely in a small minority when it comes to Coldplay, too, because I appear to be the only person who hasn’t seen them on their endless Music of the Spheres tour. My timeline is full of love and good cheer for the efforts of Chris Martin and the other three blokes who are in the band with him. Which can only be a good thing. There is little doubt that Coldplay are currently the biggest band in the world. And there are plenty of good reasons for this.
Obviously, it’s all about Chris Martin, the charismatic front man who writes the songs that make the whole world, or most of it, sing. Indeed, few songwriters understand the musical G Spot of music fans than Martin. Certainly, the Killers at their peak produced bangers by the year, although unlike Coldplay they are sailing close to the AOR heritage circuit now.
A friend of mine referred on social media the other day to the hate Coldplay apparently attract. Because of the way I try to control my social media pages, happily I haven’t seen any of the hate, but I don’t doubt that it’s there. The band are, after all, fabulously successful and that doesn’t fit in to well with much of the British psyche. If people really hate Coldplay, as I hate Queen ( and trust me, I really hate Queen), then maybe they need to give their heads a big wobble.
If I hate Queen (did I mention that?), then I don’t particularly care for Coldplay. I like Chris Martin, who recently turned up at an old haunt of mine, the Stag at Hinton Charterhouse, and played on the pub piano. He’s clearly a genuine and supremely talented man, which is to be celebrated. Years ago, Coldplay were a mere support act at Bristol’s Louisiana, a wonderful but tiny venue, and they have reached the top, I imagine, through hard work. Yes, like so many modern stars of the arts, Martin had a privileged private education which may have helped him to start with – after all, that’s why rich people send their children to elite private schools – but that will only take you so far.
That I find their music drab, generic and clichéd stadium rock doesn’t mean I hate them. That would be just silly, just like my hatred of…oh, let’s not go there, again.
I hope that by going to the high profile gigs, occasional concert goers will look beyond the big stadia behemoths and support the smaller acts, grafting hard to earn a living in the small halls, where the likes of Coldplay began. Trust me, we’ve never lived in a brighter and better era of new music and if you like Coldplay, then you might just like Baxter Dury, Lanterns on the Lake, Tinariwen, BC Camplight, Steve Mason and Westerman, all of whom have released albums I have gone on to buy.
Coldplay certainly do rule the world (of music). It would be nice if in a few years they weren’t the only act selling out mega stadia all over the land.
