The musical piece that has swept stadiums from Sao Paulo to Stockholm this week, passing through Barcelona, is neither a legendary rock band, a powerful diva, nor a radical pop reformer; A group of ordinary looking guys in their mid-40s singing beautiful, uplifting and environmentally friendly songs. With four concerts in Estadi (the only concert in Spain; this is Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday), Coldplay is going where giants like U2 or Bruce Springsteen have not gone, leaving a trail of surprise among music analysts.
What does Coldplay need to do to evoke such snaps? We try to find it by participating in different frameworks: musical, industrial, social, emotional. Whatever it was, it fit in with the spirit of the times and the unprecedented number of concerts in this city (more than 200,000 tickets were sold last August). they began to take advantage of the post-pandemic state of mental emancipation. Revenge of life?
Climb to the top step by step
While Coldplay’s growth has not been reined in in recent years, it did not happen overnight. Founded in London in 1997, this group went through mandatory steps in Barcelona: From Apolo (performed in front of 700 people in 2000), Through Razzmatazz (2002), Palau Olímpic de Badalona (2003) and Palau Sant Jordi (2005 and 2008) and interim Espacio Movistar (2008). From there to our first leap to the Olympic Stadium in 2009, doubled by two nights seven years later, an achievement that has already got us raising our eyebrows.
With all this, Chris Martin and company build a compact fan base that grows with them and doesn’t abandon them despite them. recent tweaks to their sound (less rock, more colorful and escapist). The initial influence of Travis, U2 or Radiohead gave way to “Petergabrielish” atmospheres, pop cakes and exotic accents. In concerts, past and present coexist, and followers from different age groups can feel that they are valued.
Consolidated catalog and strategic duets
Coldplay has been successful as a group dating back to the era of social media, combining their characters as established catalog artists with the construction of new hits. An unusual position: Classics often no longer produce hits. They’ve managed to transcend the generational niche, and there’s a key here.duets with artists getting younger or any other musical aesthetic. Collaborations and “feature” are the order of the day and are encouraged by the industry to transcend audiences and multiply the power of artists to bring together.
There, Coldplay has already had some standout dates at other times: Jay-Z (2008), Rihanna (2012) and The Chainsmokers (2017). And more recently, Selena Gómez (“Leave Someone”) and above all, South Korean strong combo BTS in the movie “My Universe” (2021), This issue filled them with gold and platinum records on half the planet.
Positive energy and confetti rain
The quartet has found a vein in the perception of good vibrations, positive energy and concert as an agora. Share the best wishes for humanity. Sold as “experiences”, “shows” are “shows” where participants are given luminous bracelets to make the stands look magical and culminate with rains of confetti.
All of this is then passed on from one tour to the next by word of mouth so that on the next date all family, friends and neighbors want to ‘live’ a Coldplay concert. in addition to all this to cultivate the virtues of the songbook, especially the one produced from his fourth album ‘Viva la vida or death and all hiss’ (2008), whose main song is a motivating agent for Guardiola’s Barça, has refreshing features: It turned out to be the best song to listen to. According to a study by Cambridge University psychologist David M. Greenberg, it’s the critical time to get up in the morning.
A caravan with environmental alibi
When they released ‘Everyday Life’ in 2019, they said they wouldn’t be going on tour until they found a way to make it sustainable. Did they get it? The group is taking a wide variety of environmental measures to convince us that this giant ‘tour’ is not what it seems. Starting with the use of transfers and commercial flights (not private) in biofuel trucks, measures aimed at reducing carbon emissions by 50%. On the other hand, it should be said that the concentration of concerts in several cities stimulates air traffic among the participants.
There are other vectors of the ecological wager: besides solar panels lined up on the stage, kinetic carpets (which turn people’s jumps into energy) and organic materials biodegradable confetti and LED wristbands, which participants must return at the end of the concert. In concerts, free water is offered to the public in reusable bottles, as well as plastic-free sales.
Bed of a powerful ‘hit’ battery
While ‘Viva la vida’ is an excellent Coldplay anthem in Barcelona, their catalog features at least a dozen rich ‘hits’, some of them from their early days. on Spotify, nine of her songs have been viewed more than 1,000 million timesand ‘Viva la vida’ isn’t even the first one out there: ‘Scientist’ (2002), ‘Yellow’ (2000) and the most announced ‘Something just like this’, its encounter with electronics surpassed it. duo The Chainsmokers (2017), with 2.137 million.
To all this, it doesn’t matter what ‘Music of the Spheres’ (2021) received the most negative reviews of his career, 55 out of 100 on the Metacritic review scale (three stars in ‘Rolling Stone’ and only two in ‘The Guardian’; three stars in EL PERIÓDICO from Prensa Ibérica) because it is based on a Coldplay tour. another parameter class. The unambiguous purpose is to convey the idea that the concert is where you should be, and to internalize the question ‘urbi et orbi’: why not watch Coldplay?