As Coldplay’s notorious Kisscam roamed the stands of Hull’s Craven Park Stadium, the locals puckered up to get their faces on the big screen.
The audience focused camera caused a controversy when it caught an adulterous couple in its glare at a concert in Massachusetts in July, but it certainly didn’t make their Yorkshire audience wary.
“If life gives you lemons you’ve gotta make lemonade,” joked frontman Chris Martin about their continued use of the kisscam, as he picked out a very willing bunch of locals to serenade. One woman conspicuously thrust her chest towards the camera while Martin improvised a humorous ditty about being confronted by a “36 treble double D”, then joked “I don’t think that’s a real size. I’ve never bought a bra!”
Chris Martin kept fans entertained with stories and banter – Gary Stafford
Amidst all the fervour about the noisy return of Oasis, their heirs as the UK’s most popular band have slipped back into the country to play a record breaking ten nights at Wembley Stadium. Oasis logged seven. Sometimes it’s the quiet ones you have to watch out for.
Once dismissed as “bedwetters” by Oasis’s provocative label boss Alan McGee, Coldplay’s softer, sleeker and more synthetically modern brand of anthemic songcraft has made them pretty much unassailable as the most successful British band of the 21st Century. Now in its third year running, their Music of the Spheres tour has sold over 12 million tickets around the world, leaving Taylor Swift’s Eras in the dust to make it the highest attended tour in history.
Playing to 50,000 fans over two nights at Hull may be an intimate warm up for Coldplay but they treated it like it was the greatest honour ever bestowed upon a humble rock band. “This is concert 212 of 360 and as far we’re concerned that’s been 211 rehearsals for Hull,” announced frontman Chris Martin. “We had to wait till we were tip top ready. It already looks like it could be our best show ever.”
The band joked their other 211 concerts were rehearsals for the Hull gig – Gary Stafford / Avalon
The Music of the Spheres tour has sold over 12 million tickets – James Hoggarth
The thing about Coldplay is that they give it everything every time. They use so many special effects it’s a wonder there’s any left over for anyone else. Their greatest special effect, though, is Chris Martin himself, whose energy, joy and cheery banter fills all the spaces between songs with humour, character and charisma.
There’s a delight and spontaneity in evidence all too rare at this level of stadium entertainment. When he mistakenly thanked Hull football club instead of the rugby club for the use of Craven Park stadium, he joked “please don’t put that on YouTube, we’ve had enough of that viral nonsense”.
Sometimes I think it is a pity that Coldplay have become musically less interesting with every recent release, as if on a quest to hone their sound to be a kind of global pop panacea of uplifting melody and positive messaging. Songs from their early years (The Scientist, Viva La Vida, Clocks, Yellow, Fix You) strike home with an emotional and musical richness that has been sacrificed for pop directness.
But you can’t really argue with this level of entertainment. Coldplay put on a monumental feelgood show that makes every other stadium band look like they are not trying hard enough.
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