Coldplay's best-regarded album really pulls out all the stops to make you fall for it. Like a suave pickup artist, it strikes the right tones and employs endless repetition to hypnotize and break down defenses. You don't even know it's happening, and then you're both back at your place.
Hypnosis is the key. Seven of the eleven songs are in the 5-6 minute mark and you barely notice because there are no big changes, no signposts, just the laneline click of an open road, just the whirring of slots in a clockless casino. I'm reminded of Michael Campbell's description of U2 and Bruce
Springsteen's grasps at significant music: when a song varies only slightly over time it can be simple and
serious. This music is too big, too meaningful to deign to be interesting. This message is so important that it deserves 5 and a half minutes of the same backing tracks.
But in the listening, it's all a bit telegraphed. Each song opens with a beat and a chiming melody follows, then a keening vocal line, and by then backbone is laid, and a fairly standard verse-chorus-verse song falls out, severely gilded with effects and just-the-right-chord chords. Moby circa Play would be proud. And in fact, this is more of an electronica album than a rock album: it's all about feeling and rhythm and pulse and losing yourself in the moment. There's no real sincerity there though, it all feels like an exercise, a cagey hooker who make you think she really cares. It has its moments, but its ultimately unsatisfying, and it never feels much like the real thing 2.5/5
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