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PEOPLE & ARTS Monday 25 noveMber 2019

Coldplay do a 180-degree turn from arena pop-rock

By MARK KENNEDY a Bob Dylan lyric, a novel Weapon." The band even
Associated Press by Khaled Hosseini, audio seems to reference them-
Coldplay, "Everyday Life" of a bullying traffic stop by selves ("Boom bo-boom
(Parlophone/Atlantic) a cop in Philadelphia, an boom" from "X Marks the
At the end of a year that elegy to Africa, samples Spot.") Sometimes it feels
saw musicians like Niall from Nigerian composer less than an album and
Horan and Ed Sheeran Harcourt Whyte and jazz more like a multimedia
gingerly dip their toes into legend Alice Coltrane, the project.
other languages, Coldplay South African activist song Fans will find that, sonically,
have responded: Hold my "Jikelele" and an exuberant the band has stepped off
European beer. tune about Syrian refugees the dance floor. The new
Their new album, "Everyday ("Orphans," which features music is less bombastic and
Life," is so utterly embrac- a credit for Martin's teen- more intimate. "Old Friends"
ing of the world that is has age son, Moses). is a mournful ode to loss,
words spoken or sung in "Orphans" is really the only while "Daddy" is sung from
Arabic, Spanish, Zulu and traditional-sounding Cold- the heartbreaking per-
Igbo, and even a French play song. The others are of- spective of an abandoned
verse sung by lead singer ten subdued, instrumental child. "Daddy are you OK?/
Chris Martin. or undercooked. "I haven't Look dad we got the same
It's a fluid and experimental finished this one yet" say the hair." There's even spots of
53-minute double album, liner notes on the stripped- gospel and funk-jazz.
divided into two halves, Sun- down and fragmentary The band is also playing
rise and Sunset. If on 2015's "WOTW/POTP." It's an aston- with time, with lyrics and This cover image released by Parlophone/Atlantic shows "Ev-
"A Head Full of Dreams," the ishing, unsafe step from a credits seemingly created eryday Life," a release by Coldplay.
band sampled the likes of band who could have just on an old typewriter and Associated Press
Barack Obama and a Rumi kept giving us "Something offering old timey band
poem, now they're dou- Like This." portraits that recall those most of the album is about Martin sings. "Got to keep
bling down. There are ambient sounds famous shots of The Band. faith — all faiths, from East dancing when the lights go
"Everyday Life" is bursting and snippets from films, in- There are also political Asian Buddhism to Pakistani out." In response to an ailing
with idiosyncratic referenc- cluding the documentaries songs — the menacing Sufism. "How in the world world, Coldplay are open-
es, ranging from the film "Everything Is Incredible" "Trouble in Town" and the am I going to see/You as ing their arms wide and re-
"E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial" to and "Fela Kuti: Music is the sarcastic "Guns" — but my brother not my enemy," fusing to stop believing.q