The Official Needles and Grooves 1001 Album Generator Project (aka Preachin’ about the Preachers if today’s selection sucks)

TenderLovingKiller® said:
I really enjoyed Parachutes. Coldplay were in with Gomez, Travis, The Doves, bands that rushed in to fill the void of guitar based UK Rock the Radiohead had abandoned with Kid A/Amnesia. A Rush Of Blood To The Head was the album where, for better or worse, they started embracing their inner U2. The singles on this album are all quite good but it was this album when Chris Martin started dating Gwyneth Paltrow and hanging out with Jay-Z. This album was the turning point and nothing since this album has done much for me. I don’t own any Coldplay on vinyl but I wouldn’t be opposed to picking up Parachutes at some point and if the singles from AROBTTH came on the radio wouldn’t change the station but that’s about it.
Click to expand...
This.

Bought this at the time when I was buying CDs and it was cheap, but I don’t think I’ve listened to it really since it came out. It’s kind of impacted by the scabby touch of their later output.

Also, I saw them live twice around this era, and they never played Shiver, which was always my favourite.
 
TrainFan73 said:
I can understand a lot of the criticism of Coldplay. However, I really like Parachutes. I really like this album and I really think Viva La Vida is their best work. The rest of their catalog is either retreads of the first two albums (X&Y, Ghost Stories) or weird experiments in pop that never quite work out (all the albums with weird names).

There is for sure a formula that was written here but I don’t think it was formulaic until X&Y.

I think @TenderLovingKiller® is on to it with their wanting to be U2 but I think that is evident with Parachutes as well. Parachutes is jangly indie pop not completely unlike War - except built in a post Radiohead world instead of in a merely post Punk world. This is the bombastic approach of Joshua Tree.

Reading the entry in the book and learning that A Whisper and Clocks were composed at the request of outside folks, I get some of the accusations of them being baked in a lab I’ve seen/heard through the years (although this is rich following YHF - an example of the record label and execs fucking up hard core in their taste making audacity - that being said this album is multiplatinum compared to YHF’s mere gold status. I’m also positive this success correlates to the relative disdain for the band in the music intelligentsia.)

It being released a few months after YHF and a few months ahead of the first anniversary of 9/11, I’m sure the radio friendly melancholy had a lot to do with its success.

I wasn’t fully aware of Coldplay until a few years after all this. Viva was the first time I was aware of them during the album cycle. I was astounded at knowing all of this album by the time I picked it up. (It would be several years later before I picked up Parachutes).

As a side note, I wonder, for me, how much being into Coldplay during that Rush to Viva period had to do with me receiving Radiohead better. I did not like Pablo Honey upon release and still have a complicated relationship with that album. My brother was an avid Radiohead fan from go… so I was more than aware of their music as their career progressed but it wasn’t for me.. I didn’t board that train until Hail to the Thief. That one connected with me and I very quickly acquired their entire discography and have been a fan since but not to the lengths of some of the cats around these parts.
Click to expand...
Interesting that you lump Ghost Stories in with a retread of their early albums. To me Ghost Stories and Everyday Life are their 2 kind of oddball albums. Ghost Stories is mellow and moody. I'll also defend until the grave that X&Y is one of their best albums.

I'm generally fine with Coldplay. I have trouble with their more pop leaning albums but I think their latest album was fine. I saw the Music of the Spheres tour and they are still one of the best live bands I've seen.

I know they get a bit of a reputation for being a U2 rip off but there's a generation where Coldplay might actually be their U2.

As for this album, I know people love it. I do really enjoy listening to it but it's actually not one that I revisit often. "Clocks" is a bit overrated as a single. If it wasn't for the catchy piano hook it would be a pretty forgettable song. "Politik" is one of the all time great opening tracks though.
 
TenderLovingKiller® said:
I really enjoyed Parachutes. Coldplay were in with Gomez, Travis, The Doves, bands that rushed in to fill the void of guitar based UK Rock the Radiohead had abandoned with Kid A/Amnesia. A Rush Of Blood To The Head was the album where, for better or worse, they started embracing their inner U2. The singles on this album are all quite good but it was this album when Chris Martin started dating Gwyneth Paltrow and hanging out with Jay-Z. This album was the turning point and nothing since this album has done much for me. I don’t own any Coldplay on vinyl but I wouldn’t be opposed to picking up Parachutes at some point and if the singles from AROBTTH came on the radio wouldn’t change the station but that’s about it.
Click to expand...
This is pretty much exactly my take on them too.
 
jamieanderson1968 said:
For me, it’s not that I dislike Coldplay, I am just indifferent to them. They have so little impact on my own experiences with music and what I have heard there is nothing compelling in the music to push me to give them another listen.
Click to expand...

Yeah this. They have a couple of decent tunes on those first two albums but that’s really about it. They almost feel like a band that’s gotten huge because they’re so inoffensive and safe. To be honest none of those early 00s Radiohead aping bands (these muse travis etc.) really inspire me any way, some got parts of the sound, some got the angst, none of them it felt ever really got the “it” that made Radiohead special.
 
Joe Mac said:
Yeah this. They have a couple of decent tunes on those first two albums but that’s really about it. They almost feel like a band that’s gotten huge because they’re so inoffensive and safe. To be honest none of those early 00s Radiohead aping bands (these muse travis etc.) really inspire me any way, some got parts of the sound, some got the angst, none of them it felt ever really got the “it” that made Radiohead special.
Click to expand...
At least with Muse and Coldplay, I think what turned me off (add Snow Patrol to the mix) is that they started aiming specifically for Arena Anthems, which is such a formulaic style that rarely appeals to me. That's the U2 turn they all made. I never really got the comparison to Radiohead (Muse's first two albums aside) because they so obviously moved in such different directions.
 
Hemotep said:
At least with Muse and Coldplay, I think what turned me off (add Snow Patrol to the mix) is that they started aiming specifically for Arena Anthems, which is such a formulaic style that rarely appeals to me. That's the U2 turn they all made. I never really got the comparison to Radiohead (Muse's first two albums aside) because they so obviously moved in such different directions.
Click to expand...

Yeah I get that but my feeling at the time in Britain was that following the implosion of britpop that those bands sorta eschewed that came in on the wake of Radiohead. I see definite stylistic cues in there, particularly with Muse’s debut, whilst also feeling that they totally missed the point. I do remember around 00 feeling pretty grim as a 17 year old music fan, there was no real scene to latch on to. In retrospect it was a hell of a year for music, just none of it was really tied together into a scene.
 
I think music as a whole took a different avenue around this time. There was that whole NYC scene in the early 2000s. I can’t really think of another big scene after that. Foreign Exchange formed in 2002 (there may have been other groups that did not actually exist as an entity in the same town or whatever, but they are certainly the first I can think of that didn’t exist as a unit that got in a studio and recorded together) and music became a global scene with genre eroding over time.

Meanwhile you’ve got the Napster thing happening and the whole industry shifting over the next two decades.

It’s an interesting period of history.
 
TrainFan73 said:
I think music as a whole took a different avenue around this time. There was that whole NYC scene in the early 2000s. I can’t really think of another big scene after that. Foreign Exchange formed in 2002 (there may have been other groups that did not actually exist as an entity in the same town or whatever, but they are certainly the first I can think of that didn’t exist as a unit that got in a studio and recorded together) and music became a global scene with genre eroding over time.
Click to expand...

The whole New York scene exploded with the strokes a year after this. That and the similar but distinct scene that started in England the year after are probably the last scenes we had for sure. I don’t know that the way the internet and music has evolved since really allows for something like that as much anymore.
 
dbarila said:
I got more into the British bands from this time (Coldplay, Doves, Muse, Starsailor, Travis, Elbow etc..) than I did the NY scene.
Click to expand...

That scene never really did take off or feel all that coherent though. It was more just a bunch of blokes with feelings bands that were all a bit different musically but came out at a similar time. Coldplay had big success, Muse moderate, and Elbow took 7 more years to almost be rediscovered.

The whole new rock revolution scene from 2002 to probably about 2010 felt more like a scene being in it with the way you’d discover bands through bands, great gigs with great supports and mental club nights.
 
Joe Mac said:
That scene never really did take off or feel all that coherent though. It was more just a bunch of blokes with feelings bands that were all a bit different musically but came out at a similar time. Coldplay had big success, Muse moderate, and Elbow took 7 more years to almost be rediscovered.

The whole new rock revolution scene from 2002 to probably about 2010 felt more like a scene being in it with the way you’d discover bands through bands, great gigs with great supports and mental club nights.
Click to expand...
The entire everything changed and instead of these insular local things happening a kind of global scene started. Access to music changed - it wasn’t just what you had access to through traditional distribution, your collection, friends and the library. It was the beginning of having access to everything all the time.
 
Like I’m struggling to think of an actual scene after this period. Even when the Avetts kind of blew up and a whole bunch of bands here in NC kind of ran with what they were doing, it wasn’t a Charlotte thing - it was an across the state thing.

If you really think about it, music history has evolved very quickly since the advent of recording. There is a definite shift in the 70s though when Hip Hop starts. You no longer needed to be able to play a musical instrument to make music. The home computer leads to you not needing a studio to make high quality product. The internet does away with not only the traditional distribution system but the need to fund a physical product.
 
Joe Mac said:
That scene never really did take off or feel all that coherent though. It was more just a bunch of blokes with feelings bands that were all a bit different musically but came out at a similar time. Coldplay had big success, Muse moderate, and Elbow took 7 more years to almost be rediscovered.

The whole new rock revolution scene from 2002 to probably about 2010 felt more like a scene being in it with the way you’d discover bands through bands, great gigs with great supports and mental club nights.
Click to expand...
True. But Being in the US where these bands weren't nearly as popular, I guess I can't really say I cared much about a "scene". I just thought they all had some good tunes.

I also had a college radio show where my format was Britpop and these bands made for some good play to compliment all of the 90's stuff I was playing.
 
dbarila said:
True. But Being in the US where these bands weren't nearly as popular, I guess I can't really say I cared much about a "scene". I just thought they all had some good tunes.

I also had a college radio show where my format was Britpop and these bands made for some good play to compliment all of the 90's stuff I was playing.
Click to expand...

Ah yeah I was just last couple of years of school and the nightlife was shocking. Going to all the effort of sneaking into clubs only for it to be either cheesy dance or nu-metal.
 
TrainFan73 said:
Like I’m struggling to think of an actual scene after this period. Even when the Avetts kind of blew up and a whole bunch of bands here in NC kind of ran with what they were doing, it wasn’t a Charlotte thing - it was an across the state thing.

If you really think about it, music history has evolved very quickly since the advent of recording. There is a definite shift in the 70s though when Hip Hop starts. You no longer needed to be able to play a musical instrument to make music. The home computer leads to you not needing a studio to make high quality product. The internet does away with not only the traditional distribution system but the need to fund a physical product.
Click to expand...
00 NYC Indie Rock scene was the last one on par with late 80s/early 90s Seattle, 80s Manchester, late 60s/early 70s Laurel Canyon, late 70s CBGB’s NYC, etc…

The internet has kinda changed all of that. A scene is driven by the community that supports it but the internet allows all sorts of micro scenes to flourish but none are huge or super influential nor are they particularly tied to a specific area (though some are) ones that jump out to me would be the indie Rock Scenes in Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver, who all felt they had a moment in the mid to late 00s. There was also the Olde English Spelling Bee/Underwater People/Woodist scene that was mostly based around New Jersey bands like Titus Andronicus and Real Estate from the late 2000s or the Windmill Scene scene from a few years back based around bands that frequented Brixton based club, The Windmill playing modern post-punk, Black Country, New Road, Squid, Black MIDI, Shame, Dry Cleaning. There have been plenty more post NYC micro-scenes but none of those are remotely comparable to those bigger more influential scenes from before the 00s NYC scene.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top