OPINION: Coldplay album has little success, ultimately disappoints | Culture

Seven-time Grammy-winning group Coldplay released their ninth studio album “Music of the Spheres” on October 15.

This 12-track set explores a theme of space and time with a mix of short interludes, catchy songs and mournful ballads. While there are a few captivating songs on “Music of the Spheres,” Coldplay’s new album was disappointing overall. This is due in part to the lack of lyrical substance. With phenomenal backtracks to accompany the songs, many lyrics did not reach their full potential.

Singer Chris Martin explained the inspiration behind this album during an interview on the Zach Sang Show.

“I was watching Star Wars once, and they had the scene with the Cantina group,” Martin said. “And I was like, ‘I wonder what musicians are like across the universe? And that led to it all and now here we are.

In my opinion, the two best tracks on the album are “Higher Power” and “My Universe”. Both were previously released as singles and include catchy lyrics with an upbeat feel that could brighten up anyone’s day.

According to an interview with British radio station 95-106 Capital FM, “Higher Power” was broadcast for the first time for French astronaut Tom Pesquet, who listened from the International Space Station.

“The song is about trying to find the astronaut in all of us, the person who can do amazing things,” Martin said.

“My Universe” explores the wonderful aspects of love and features South Korean boy group, BTS. The track has verses in English and Korean, but the main chorus is in English. The song, released on September 24, debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts on October 9, making it a hit before the rest of the album was released a week later.

Martin explained in an interview with Kelly Clarkson what the song means to him.

“We really don’t believe in any boundaries or separation of anything, and so the song ‘My Universe’ is about someone being told they can’t love another person, or can’t be with them. that breed, or that he can’t be gay, no matter what, ”Martin said. “We thought it would be nice to sing this with BTS because maybe we’re not meant to be together.”

Other notable songs on the album are “Humankind” and “Let Somebody Go”. “Humankind” is the third track on the album, and it fits the overall theme well. It appears to be an alien from another planet hearing music, perhaps for the first time, and the exhilarating experience he has listening to music. This is a fast tempo song with euphonic guitar and keyboard parts that take the song up a notch.

“Let Somebody Go” is a sad ballad with Selena Gomez. Martin’s dismal voice blends perfectly with Gomez’s warm voice. This song does a wonderful job of depicting the pain of grief with lyrics such as “Now turn off all the stars because I know it / It hurts like this / To let someone go. ”

As good as those songs are, several tracks on this album missed the mark. “❤️”, “People Of The Pride”, “Biutyful” and “Coloratura” were all missing in some areas. Some of them even had great meaning behind them, but the execution just wasn’t there.

Tunes like “❤️” and “Coloratura” were bland and boring. While the back track of “Coloratura” was captivating, the lyrics couldn’t hold my attention while the lyrics of “❤️” captured my attention, but the lack of background music made the song much less appealing.

On the other hand, “Biutyful” sounded a lot like a children’s song where you can listen to it once, but after that it gets irritating. The high-pitched electronic voice contributed to this feeling. “People Of The Pride” might have been a good song if the lyrics had been designed to be smarter. I also think this hard rock song would fit better with someone else’s voice. Martin just doesn’t have the right voice for a song like this.

Finally, songs like “🪐”, “✨”, “🌎” and “♾” simply lacked substance. They were all pretty enjoyable interludes, but I wouldn’t add these short instrumentals to any of my playlists. The only thing I liked about them was that they mixed well with the song that followed them in the track list, almost making them sound like a long intro for the next song.

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