Coldplay featuring Rihanna is not a nightmare or worst case scenario, but it’s actually quite occurred in “Princess of China”, one of the 14 new songs of the fifth studio album by Coldplay, “Mylo Xyloto”. And don’t matter what, after all these years and efforts, Coldplay are still not U2. “Charlie Brown” for instance, taste like U2, but it isn’t. Chris Martin might never reach the charm of Bono, but his struggling and trying.
The previous album, “Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends”, in 2008, established a recording HQ at a disused bakery in Primrose Hill, North London, where they recorded, but Coldplay relocated to a vacant church, also in north London, to work on their new album in collaboration with Brian Eno. “Mylo Xyloto” seems to be a concept album. According to Chris Martin, the album is “based on a love story with a happy ending.”, in which the two protagonists: Mylo and Xyloto, are living in an oppressive, dystopian urban environment, meet one another through a gang called “The Lost Boys”, and fall in love. Lyrically, the album is inspired by “old school American graffiti” and “the White Rose Movement”, and Martin also said that the album was influenced by HBO TV series “The Wire.” Musically, Coldplay have stated that they want this album to be “more acoustic” and “more intimate” than its predecessor. And here we go, we’ve got “Mylo Xyloto”, set for official release on 24 October 2011.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6ZWlDks0nQ&w=545&h=307]
Eventually might be labeled romantic or neo-romantic, “Mylo Xyloto” is a Brit style mixture of pop and indie rock, quite powerless and this time even sort of uninspired. The 44 minutes seems pretty much boring and not even a wizard as Brian Eno can save the unsaveable. The album sounds bright and probably surgically perfect, it might be an engineering masterpiece, but suffers exactly of a massive lack of romanticism, of soul and heart, of simple, pure, uncorrupted human feelings. It’s a secondhand collection of recycled themes and melodies, an opaque sequences of patterns and cliches. And it has a spirit that reminds me the 80s and bands such as Tears For Fears.
“Mylo Xyloto” actually is a new wave/synth pop album re-sampled into mainly acoustic (unplugged) songs. Nice, but irrelevant, bloody boring and out of beat.
Tracklist:
01 – Mylo Xyloto
02 – Hurts Like Heaven
03 – Paradise
04 – Charlie Brown
05 – Us Against the World
06 – M.M.I.X.
07 – Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall
08 – Major Minus
09 – U.F.O.
10 – Princess of China
11 – Up in Flames
12 – A Hopeful Transmission
13 – Don’t Let It Break Your Heart
14 – Up with the Birds
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