Trivia / Coldplay

• Ascended Meme: Jonny liking cake initially began as a running joke on Coldplay forums in the late 2000s. Only a decade later in a 2021 Twitter Q&A did Jonny finally confirm that, yes, he likes cake.
• Banned in China: Parachutes, due to "Spies" being interpreted as a potshot at their form of communism. Buckland commented that the banning was "really weird."
• Black Sheep Hit: Parachutes is practically a Black Sheep Album — its intimate, acoustic style doesn't sound like any of Coldplay's other albums, and the band find it rubbish now, save for "Yellow," which remains a concert favorite.
• Breakthrough Hit: "Yellow".
• Chart Displacement: While in their native UK their highest-charting songs are not surprising (19 top ten hits!), in the US there's a whole slew of them.
  • Along with "Viva La Vida", one of their two #1 hits is "My Universe", an equally-billed collaboration with BTS. Their other top 10 hits by themselves (thus discounting "Something Just Like This", their equally-credited collaboration with The Chainsmokers) are "Speed of Sound", which is not even the the best-known song from X&Y (an honor that likely goes to the #59 "Fix You"), and "A Sky Full of Stars", which is eclipsed by plenty of songs from before ("Yellow" was #48, "The Scientist" and "In My Place" didn't chart, "Clocks" was #29, "Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall" was #14 and "Paradise" #15) and after (the #13 "Adventure of a Lifetime" and the #25 "Hymn for the Weekend").
  • On Alternative Airplay, very late single "Orphans" reached #1, while the completely forgotten "Lost!" peaked at #10, beating most of their output, due to Jay-Z releasing a rap version of the song (titled "Lost+") which he performed at the 2009 Grammy Awards.
• Colbert Bump: The constant use of "Sparks" on TikTok led to the song shooting in popularity in the 2020s, becoming their most popular deep cut on streaming services.
• Creator Backlash:
  • According to Chris, the band has collectively disowned Parachutes as "terrible music", save for fan favorites such as "Yellow". However, they haven't completely turned their back on the album; when "Sparks", a Parachutes song considered by fans to be one of the band's greatest deep cuts, won a YouTube Community poll for songs fans wanted to hear them perform, they were happy to oblige.
  • Another fan favorite, "Speed of Sound", received a similar reverse-vindication when Chris admitted in 2011 to no longer enjoying the song due to the band reportedly not recording it to its fullest potential. The band now rarely plays the song live.
• Creator Breakdown: Ghost Stories was made after Chris and his wife Gwyneth Paltrow divorced, and the album is conceptually rooted in the internal turmoil of emotional recovery after a breakup.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes:
  • Coldplay's debut EP Safety is perhaps one of the most extreme examples of this trope. Only 500 copies were ever produced, and of those 500 copies, only about 50 made it into public circulation (as the rest were given to friends, family and record companies), making it extremely rare. When copies do show up, they typically command up to $6,000. Thankfully, all songs that appear on it were released in subsequent EP releases, so at least you're not missing out on any content, but if you're going for 100% Completion, be prepared to some dosh...
  • To a much lesser extent, their second EP The Blue Room (the original release, that is) is quite rare. Only 5,000 copies were made and can cost upwards of $100 on eBay. Thankfully, not only was it e-released but it's also available on iTunes and streaming. As an added bonus, 2 out of the three songs on Safety are on The Blue Room (the other, "No More Keeping My Feet On The Ground", was on the Yellow EP, which is also on iTunes).
  • There were six songs included on the bonus DVD for the Latin American Tour Edition of X&Y: "Things I Don't Understand", "Proof", "The World Turned Upside Down", "Pour Me (Live at the Hollywood Bowl)", "Sleeping Sun", and "Gravity". The first four songs were eventually released on EPs, or in the case of "Proof", as its own individual single, all of which have been archived on streaming services. However, "Sleeping Sun" and "Gravity" have yet to be rereleased in any form, thus keeping them from being put up on streaming services. "Gravity" especially is an egregious case, as it's often considered one of Coldplay's best songs.
  • "Lhuna", a Viva-era song featuring Kylie Minogue as a guest vocalist released for the (RED)Wire in 2008 as a charity single was never released on streaming services.
• Meaningful Release Date: National Space Day falls on the first Friday of May, and the single "Higher Power" was released on May 7th, 2021, the first Friday of that month. This fits the themes of the song and the subsequent album that would be announced, Music of the Spheres.
• Referenced by...: Canadian figure skater Roman Sadovsky performed to "Fix You" for his exhibition number at the 2019 NHK Trophy.
• Shrug of God: The bandmembers rarely give specific explanations of a song's meaning (though they love to give fake ones). For example, Chris says that he doesn't know what "Yellow" is about, while Jonny jokes that it's about bananas.
• Troubled Production: The band isn't really fond of X&Y and their sourness with it can be traced back to the time of its production. For starters, they were struggling with writing new songs and weren't satisfied with the results, causing them to scrap their initial material and start over again. It wasn't helped by the growing tensions within, notably with Chris and Guy, and Phil Harvey, who was their manager at the time, dropped off of the project, making it their only album to not have his input. Outside factors, such as the high pressure from EMI (Parlophone's parent company at the time) and their rapidly growing popularity, and subsequent backlash, also took a toll on them during the making of the album.
• What Could Have Been: "Til Kingdom Come" was written to have Johnny Cash as a guest musician in mind. Unfortunately, Cash passed away before the recording of the song.
• Viral Marketing:
  • The lyric videos for "Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall".
  • A preview for their single "Higher Power" was posted 4 days early exclusively on TikTok, allowing users to use the sound in their own videos, including Coldplay themselves.

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