Coldplay
Shoreline amphitheater
August 19th 2005

Coldplay as a band is a bit deceptive. When you hear their music on the radio or on a CD it has a very laid back, smooth, quiet feel and sound to it. This is not what they are like live. I remember the first time I saw them live, I fell completely, head over heals in love, and I have stayed a fan ever since. I had heard some of their songs on MTV and on the radio and liked them, but seeing them live is a whole different animal. They rock 100 times harder, have 1,000 times the energy and the live shows are 10,000 times more passionate. If you think that their music is good, but lacks that rock edge, you will be really surprised by seeing them live. Even their live album didn't do their live shows justice, they are just one of those "you had to be there" bands. This is the 7th maybe 8th...oh, who the hell knows how many times I have seen them and I never get tired of them. I have remained in my honeymoon phase with this band. I will, however, admit that it took me some time to warm up their new album. We had seen them twice this year(once in LA and again at Coachella) and so heard a lot of their new stuff even before the CD came out, but it is hearing the CD in it's entirety that made me love it. It has a flow and rhythm that needs to heard as a whole. Of course I have my favorite songs, but each song compliments the next. I think another reason it took me a while to really get into this CD was that it had a different feel to it than their first two CDs. The other ones felt kind of like the were playing the songs for the first time. I don't mean unrehearsed or sloppy, just like they were sung from the heart, very spontaneous. This album has a more mature, electronic, produced feel to it. This concert had the same feel.

This was definitely the best media experience of any of the Coldplay concerts I have been to. They always have really great lighting that compliments each song, but this time they added a screen behind them as they played that showed images in addition to the different lighting for each song. This worked particularly well at the Shoreline since this venue has a large tent that covers the stage and first section of seats allowing the multi-media show to spill off the screens and onto the white tent.

One of the things I have always liked about seeing this band live is the feeling that these guys are just so fucking happy to be there. They always seem to be genuinely surprised that all these people showed up to see them and they try to interface with crowd as much as possible (at least Chris Martin does, the rest of the band usually leave the talking up to him.) Chris involves the audience in the songs and tries to get them closer and get closer to them. At one point inviting the people in the higher seats to come closer during the song "God put a smile on your face," which caused a scramble to the front clogging all the aisles. After the song security shooed everyone back to their seats, much to the disappointment of those that had come closer. Chris also made several trips into the audience to sing and get the crowd singing as well. They even like their audiences so much they turned off all the lights on the stage at one point, making it pitch black, so that the band could take pictures of the crowd. All you could see from the stage were flashes of light coming from their cameras.

They played a great set of songs, the only exception being the song "Speed of Sound." Chris kept forgetting the words and even the rest of the band didn't seem to be in synch for this one. This was strange considering that the rest of the songs they played were executed perfectly. They also sang the beautiful song "kingdom come" that they had written for Johnny Cash, along with a lovely rendition of "Ring of fire."
I am hoarse from singing every song and had a great time as I always do at their shows. My only complaint is that it was a short concert in contrast to other Coldplay shows I have been to. But a little Coldplay is better than no Coldplay at all!