A great little album by a great little band

[Errant Panda]

...or 'where did it all go wrong?'




[dons flakjacket]

I still think this is a great little album, and that at the time they were a great little band (with a great guitarist).

Of course it very quickly went pear-shaped when they got too big for their boots, and way too big for their talent. The achingly self-conscious attempt to become U2 ruined them for ever.

Truth is they probably would, and should, have faded away to be fondly remembered by a small group of one time enthusiasts. But they got hoovered up in the 'next Radiohead' hype-machine that the press (and no doubt common label EMI) tried to fill the vacuum with during the long drawn-out wait for the fourth album (see also Muse), this coming out around three months before Kid A, which then defied expectations anyway. Somewhere I have an old Q in which the two main features are on Kid A and this new band Coldplay with actual songs.

Who dares to get into line with me?

[Moleskin]

One of the music channels played several Coldplay videos last night. The songs from this album were pretty good, weren't they? I think they too easily tend toward the emptily bombastic nowadays to derive much pleasure from their work.

[sloopjohnc]

I like it too.

I do think Coldplay's gone downhill despite their global popularity, but I also think part of the "stick" they get (man, I hate when Americans use English phrases) is that the English like to tear down shit once it gets popular.

[Goat Boy]

is that the English like to tear down shit once it gets popular.

Some shit is worth tearing down though.

[Bungo the Mungo]

The follow-up was much much better.

[Insouciant Western People]

Who dares to get into line with me?

Not I, said the Nick

Not I, said the Coan

Not I, said the Penk


Well then, I'll do it on my own, said the Little Red Panda.

[sloopjohnc]

is that the English like to tear down shit once it gets popular.

Some shit is worth tearing down though.

I'm not saying it isn't, but when a slap on the hand is required, the English make insults a gang initiation where everyone takes their shot even when the victim's cowering in a foetal position down on the ground.

And even then, they don't let up.

[Goat Boy]

is that the English like to tear down shit once it gets popular.

Some shit is worth tearing down though.

I'm not saying it isn't, but when a slap on the hand is required, the English make insults a gang initiation where everyone takes their shot even when the victim's cowering in a foetal position down on the ground.

And even then, they don't let up.

I blame the weather!

[Neige]

I agree about Coldplay's first.

A similar statement could be made about Travis, IMO.

[Insouciant Western People]

... the English make insults a gang initiation where everyone takes their shot even when the victim's cowering in a foetal position down on the ground.

And even then, they don't let up.

It's our public school upbringings old chap.

[Errant Panda]

... the English make insults a gang initiation where everyone takes their shot even when the victim's cowering in a foetal position down on the ground.

And even then, they don't let up.

It's our public school upbringings old chap.

Or Chris Martin's, at least.

[king feeb]

Nope. It's a boring little album by a bland little band.

The musical equivalent of a margarine sandwich on white bread. Nothing that could be considered horrible, of course, but "great"? Not a chance.

[Davey the Fat Boy]

is that the English like to tear down shit once it gets popular.

Some shit is worth tearing down though.

I'm not saying it isn't, but when a slap on the hand is required, the English make insults a gang initiation where everyone takes their shot even when the victim's cowering in a foetal position down on the ground.

And even then, they don't let up.

What I find strangest about this dynamic is how arbitrary it all seems. A good portion of the bands/artists that come in for this treatment seem no worse than a lot of the ones that are beloved by the same folks.

[Django]

I was never a fan, but I did catch them on TOTP2 over Christmas. They were showing the original TOTP performance for "Yellow", and I was struck by how Chris Martin was a kid in a t-shirt playing an acoustic guitar and enjoying himself, and then 3 or 4 years later he's dressed as a 17th century infantryman all the time, and can't sing a song without wrapping his arms round his head in a series of vogue-like positions.

What happens to these people?

[Nikki Gradual]

How easily a Google image search can go wrong and screw up an entire thread.
Here's the album you were clearly after, a genuinely great album by a great little band...

[yomptepi]

How easily a Google image search can go wrong and screw up an entire thread.
Here's the album you were clearly after, a genuinely great album by a great little band...

Ahhh

Now that is really cracking album, by a criminally underated band.

[Penk!]

Not I, said the Penk

Actually I think it's a perfectly listenable, though far from great, album; and I've always liked 'Yellow'.

[Errant Panda]

I was never a fan, but I did catch them on TOTP2 over Christmas. They were showing the original TOTP performance for "Yellow", and I was struck by how Chris Martin was a kid in a t-shirt playing an acoustic guitar and enjoying himself, and then 3 or 4 years later he's dressed as a 17th century infantryman all the time, and can't sing a song without wrapping his arms round his head in a series of vogue-like positions.

What happens to these people?

I saw them at the NIA on the tour of the next album. He explained in a kinda apologetic way that during the next song they'd turn on the lasershow...

It was like watching bambi being raped...