Coldplay Not Too ‘Yellow’ To Answer Kevin & Bean’s Questions, Give Amazing Performance At The Red Bull Sound Space

Photo by Alex Rauch

[Gallery] Kevin & Bean’s…

Considered internationally as one of the most inspired bands of both the rock and pop genre, Coldplay transforms the sounds of many genres with their note-defying, expansive instrumentation, and bittersweet lyrical storytelling.

The British band brought their iconic and intimate sound to the Red Bull Sound Space at KROQ, playing songs like “Yellow,” “Paradise,” “Viva La Vida,” “Charlie Brown,” “Fix You,” and “Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall.”

Despite the early hour, lead singer Chris Martin met Kevin & Bean‘s quips with cheeky, self-deprecating humor and adeptly answered questions about their age and the longevity of their songs, whether they are going to “get fat like Axl Rose,” the quirky name of their upcoming album, how their original name Starfish first came about, and how a certain Coldplay song may or may not have inspired an impotent horse.

Photo by Alex Rauch

“I think it was one of our biggest blessings…We’d never have gotten to meet U2 without it,” jokes Chris Martin, the ofttimes tongue-in-cheek lead singer of Coldplay. “Anytime we have anything that’s even moderately successful we’re surprised because we’re English.”

Martin is speaking of Coldplay’s song “Yellow,” a song that is considered by many to be the breakout hit that made them internationally successful–despite the popularity of  other singles from their début album Parachutes like “Trouble” and “Shiver.”

A song over a decade old and with a plethora of other songs in Coldplay’s catalog, “Yellow” is still both one of the most requested and most memorable songs written by the band.

Photo by Alex Rauch

“ We can go painting and rock climbing when we're a lot older.
” Chris Martin Drummer Will Champion, considered by Martin to be the voice of “sonic reckoning” in the band, told Kevin & Bean that regardless of the age of “Yellow,” the song “still means the same thing…Like Chris said, it helped us immensely when we first started out.”

Just as they ostensibly started their career with the song “Yellow,” Coldplay also started their set at the Red Bull Sound Space with the same song. A song about unrequited love, “Yellow” still sonically swells with an innocent hope, perhaps an entreaty of acceptance to their then-new audience.

Even though they started out as appealingly naïve and girl-crazy young lads at university, these days the members of Coldplay seem more accomplished as both artists and adults. Age has served them well as artists and the band jokingly said that they plan to live it up while they can.

“We’re all between thirty-two and thirty-four now, so we only have a limited time with our bass player being so handsome,” quips Martin. “We can go painting and rock climbing when we’re a lot older.”

Photo by Alex Rauch

“ It's a strange title. I agree and I'm sorry for that...But it had to be called that.
” Chris Martin on 'Mylo Xyloto' Known for his light-hearted sarcasm on stage, Martin is charming albeit a bit nebulous when talking about the meaning behind the title of Coldplay’s upcoming album Mylo Xyloto. Martin apologized for the confusing name, but not without a wink.

“It’s a strange title. I agree and I’m sorry for that…But it had to be called that. Maybe it’s because it couldn’t be called anything else…Like Dr. Pepper, or Coca-Cola or Google.”

In fact, Martin recently gave another equally vague answer to the New York Times, saying:

“Music comes from a place we don’t know…It sort of comes through the fingers and toes. So we came up with the idea of, what if you had musical digits, like xylo toes.”

And according to the same article, Mylo is “just a great name for anything.”

Regardless of the name of Coldplay’s fifth studio album, the cohesive, almost cinematic album full of what Bean described as musical “vignettes” is also heavy with single potential–like their second single from the album, “Paradise.”

Photo by Alex Rauch

“ We try to make it like journey and a story from start to finish...not just a collection of singles in a row.
” “We are really trying to make albums like we’re putting together movies,” explained Martin. “We try to make it like journey and a story from start to finish…not just a collection of singles in a row.”

“Paradise” creates a sort of musical portamento with their first single “Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall,” even containing a tie-in lyric with “the wheel breaks the butterfly, every tear a waterfall.”

For their second song of the morning, Coldplay performed “Paradise,” an anthemic Coldplay ballad with viscid strings, expansive guitars, and fluid piano.

Photo by Alex Rauch

Despite what Kevin & Bean insinuated as their British penchant for “self-deprecating” humor and tongue-in-cheek humility, Martin said that although many consider them to be the “biggest band in the world” that “it really doesn’t feel like that when you’re in the middle of it.”

“Like this room feels very similar to the first room we’ve ever played in.”