Coldplay

There were a few things I knew about the band Coldplay ... they have some epic singles, are Brits, the lead singer married Gwyneth Paltrow, and they were playing at the Arsenal stadium in June (which is walking distance from my house).  This stacks up to a must see event.

I racked up six tickets, a crew to come along, and on a nice Spring evening in London there we were ... in the centre of the stadium watching the performance of the UK's top selling rock album of 2011.

I'm not a routine concert goer ... I mean I really do like Coldplay with their Earthy lyrics, dreamy rhythms, and perfect timing at introducing a jam session ... but, at first this was more a "been there, done that" kind of expectation.

What this turned into though was a bit more ... a push over the edge from just a music show.  It presented those moments when you look around with stars in your eyes, see your friends laughing, feel the unity of humanity, and jump up and down like you just don't care (or maybe conversely like it is just about the most important thing you could do).

There were large video screens so you could see the band, lasers, fireworks, bright colours, mad amounts of confetti, bouncing balls, lovers holding hands, and they gave every one lighted neon bracelets that blinked in perfect coordination with the beat of the music during parts of the show.  Pretty cool effects.

If you haven't heard of them, this video Yellow was one of their first, and of course they had dense yellow lighting while they played that ... girls were swooning.  Their most recent song "Paradise" was a hit, and of course "Viva la Vida" is a classic.


As if all that weren't enough, during the cliché 'pause, leave the stage, pretend the show is over' act they changed locations, moved towards the back of the stadium and literally popped out of the ground within meters of where we were standing!  It was the ultimate ... they performed their last few songs with the four of them on just a little stage right in front of us.  Nearly front row!

A friend of mine said it was a "life event".  It was etheral.  What's more, its kind of nice to know a couple guys at London City College, who played some tunes together, made it big time, married beautiful actresses and still maintained their souls.