Monday, July 7, 2008

Viva La Vida

From the minute that the iTunes commercial began airing back in the spring with snippets of the song "Viva La Vida" by Coldplay, it was fairly obvious that this was going to be a monster hit. But the obviousness wasn't just because of the 'i' connection, as powerful as that has become these days. The more obvious factor was that the damn song was catchy. It was a good tune, and it featured great vocals by Coldplay's leading man Chris Martin (also famous as Mr. Gwyneth Paltrow.) The song has been all over the radio this summer. It has definitely been my personal favorite new tune, and is arguably going to go down as 'that song', the one that you will always equate with this particular Summer of '08. The success of the song should also be no surprise once you know that the producer is Brian Eno, he of U2 and David Bowie reputation and success (among many other projects.) What Eno did with the already great Irish rockers of U2 when he produced The Joshua Tree album, he may be repeating here with Viva La Vida for Coldplay. The band already has a worldwide following of huge numbers, and Eno's work with them here may well catapult the boys even higher. "I hear Jerusalem bells are ringing, Roman cavalry choirs are singing...Be my mirror, my sword, my shield....my missionaries in a foreign field......for some reason I can't explain, I know Saint Peter won't call my name......never an honest word, but that was when I ruled the world." Coldplay is taking the airways by storm this summer with Viva La Vida. They will be passing through Philly on July 25th on their world tour, and we can surely look for much more from this album and band in the coming months. Note: joining Coldplay on some of their stops will be Austin, Texas Indie-rockers 'Shearwater' from Matador Records. This band was handpicked by the Coldplay boys to support them, and will play at the LA shows on July 14th & 15th, the San Jose show on July 18th, and the Vegas show on July 19th.