My Coldplay.com

With a sudden jolt, a giant Cinemascope monitor illuminated the Ford Center stage Monday night, backlighting the shadowy figures of Coldplay’s Chris Martin, Jon Buckland, Will Champion and Guy Berryman. Martin leaned on the monitor, intoning the opening lines from Coldplay’s latest album, “X&Y,” to the capacity crowd.

“You’re in control. Is there anywhere you want to go?” Martin sang as a digital countdown commenced on the screen. For the next 90 minutes, Martin and Coldplay took the audience everywhere it wanted to go. It proved that in the three years since Coldplay’s performance at the Civic Center Music Hall, the Oxford, England, group has evolved into something massive: a world-class band that has no problem filling stadiums with spectacle, exuberance and its dramatic, heart-stirring music.

Coldplay’s first three songs offered a backward glance at their recording career: after “Square One,” the group launched into “Politik” from 2002’s “A Rush of Blood to the Head,” then played the song that introduced them to the United States, “Yellow.” Giant yellow balloons fell from the ceiling, bouncing through the stadium and, after a few sharp volleyball spikes from audience members, exploded with gold confetti.

The balloons were reminiscent of a favorite spectacle employed by the Flaming Lips, the local heroes who once took Coldplay on as an opening act. During a stripped-down set played at the edge of the stage, Martin thanked Lips leader Wayne Coyne for taking them on a tour of Oklahoma City that day and told the audience there were four great American voices: “Elvis, Dylan, Wayne Coyne and Johnny Cash.” Coldplay then launched into “Til’ Kingdom Come” and segued into a spirited, rough-hewn version of Cash’s “Ring of Fire.”

Older favorites such as “Don’t Panic,” in which guitarist Buckland sang a verse for the first time on the tour, were greeted warmly by the Ford Center audience, but Coldplay played at peak levels on the epic rockers from “X&Y,” and the crowd responded with jet engine-level intensity. Martin raced around the stage with athletic grace, even sprinting to the back of the stadium during the band’s encore, which featured “Swallowed by the Sea,” “Fix You” and “In My Place.”

But while most of the crowd was there for the headliner, few will forget Fiona Apple’s fierce, feral opening set. If anyone expected Apple to just sit at the piano and play quietly, she quickly disabused them of that idea. Following powerful, bluesy renditions of 2005’s “Get Him Back” and her 1996 single, “Shadowboxer,” Apple jumped up and lit into her biggest hit, “Criminal,” stalking the stage with wild-eyed intensity.

When she was not singing with such focused passion, Apple seemed to be arguing with unseen opponents on stage - she made every frustration palpable through her manic dancing. And the crowd ate it up: if Apple could have stayed longer than 45 minutes, the audience would have welcomed her back for another hour of strange magic.

Newsok - via coldplaying.com