My Coldplay.com - A Coldplay Blog

It’s handy that Europe is an hour ahead of us and Coldplay fans are eager to get online to review concerts. Thanks so much… Pictures in the gallery here.

SETLIST [ and pic thanks playflocold]

Life In Technicolor
Violet Hill
Clocks
In My Place
Cemeteries of London
Yellow
42
Speed of Sound
Chinese Sleep Chant
God Put A Smile Upon Your Face
Yes
Talk/The Hardest Part [snippets on piano]
Postcards From Far Away
Lost!
Viva La Vida
The Scientist + Will’s Death Will Never Conquer

First Encore
Politik
Lovers In Japan

Second Encore (in the backround: Talk Junkie XL Remix)
Death And All His Friends

Third Encore
Fix You
The Escapist

This from Grace

i just got back from the coldplay concert in mannheim.
four words: they. own. my. life.

well, what can i say since most of you have seen them in concert anyway? i love them to death.

the support band kinda sucked. they were not bad, i just didn’t like the music. however, i was slightly pissed when that guy came up to us (my best friend and me) and said,”you’re sitting on our seats.” he was so rude and mean. well, we stood up and checked if those were their seats or ours. long story short, those bastards sat down after they chased us away, but they were the idiots who couldn’t read properly so we got our seats back. i was just mad because they made me feel those feeling at a coldplay concert, a band that’s basically all about love. well.

when they finally came on stage after an hour and a half, i went completely bonkers. our seats were located right on the left handside of the stage, so guy faced us the entire time and we got to see them first when they came on stage!!! when they climbed the stairs i bursted into tears. i’m probably one of the few people in the world who manage to cry for “life in technicolour”. that song does not even have words!

i loved the concert. i loved every moment. i loved how the crowd repeated the “viva la vida” theme over and over again. even when they already climed their spot in the crowd to perform an acoustic version of “the scientist” and “death will never conquer”. we got both “fix you” and “cemeteries of london”, but we didn’t get “strawberry swing”, one of my favourites off the album.

and i loved the part when chris played the piano all alone and singing a slow version of “talk”. beautiful! and he was at our side of the stage!!! =)

the piano version of “talk” totally got to me. such a great band. seriously. they sounded amazing. chris’ voice was soooo good. except when he forgot the words in “lost”.

and he spoke quite a lot of german throughout the whole concert. he was sooo funny claiming we were “fucking” awesome singers.

i still need to check out the pictures i took and the crappy videos i recorded. there might be a few good ones among them.

i kept telling my best friend about the butterflies and that we’re not gonna get any because we got seats. well, i asked that nice girl if she could give a few to us and she did. and we also found a few on the floor. yes, we picked them up. yes, we did not feel too classy to do so.

when we first arrived at the venue and looked at the merchandise stands i did not intend to buy any shirts because they were just as expensive as i expected them to be. they had the same prices in america and traded the dollar sign for a euro sign! that’s quite mean. 30$ are 20€, not 30€. well, the concert blew my mind away so i went to spend 30€ on a t-shirt…

but my favourite moment was when they wanted to start their acoustic set in the crowd and everyone just kept singing the “viva la vida” theme. they were laughing a bit because we did not let them sing and made them listen to us instead.

oh, and we got “speed of sound” instead of “square one”!

i cannot sleep anyway. i am tooo excited. the adrenaline i still pumping through my veins!

chris rarely spoke english. only that one time when he said, we were “fucking great singers, seriously!”

he said stuff like “goodbye” and “how are you?” in german. and “hallo, meine freunde”, which means “hello, my friends”.

i can’t believe the concert went by so fast. i can’t remeber a thing, but then again a bilion thoughts at once cross my mind.

all i know is that my love to coldplay is like the love to your boyfriend or girlfreind multiplied by 2,493,948. and that chris is such an entertaining, fun-loving person. he’s awesome. and i wish i could see the world through his eyes and be a bit like him too.

EDIT:: no, they did not play “don’t panic” unfortunately.

They did play “yes”, if i remember correctly.
this was pretty much like a trip on drugs. i don’t even know what a trip on drugs is like, but it must feel quite similar. they palyed so many songs, but it went by by the snipping of fingers.

i think i prefer “square one” because the live performance of that song is much better compared “speed of sound”. but i still enjoyed it!

OMG! Chris kissed Guy during “chinese sleep chant”. i went completely insane when he did that. not sure if he kissed jonny too. i was too busy being looney.

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In my (orange) place.

Tuesday 2nd September 2008, 14:15. SAP Arena, Mannheim, DE.

Another day, another city, another arena, another language, another Coldplay concert, and a brand new group of Oxfam volunteers.

I have just had my lunch on day 3 of this European tour. Just before I go to set up the Oxfam stall, I wanted to finish off this post I started last night. I had a strange moment last night. Albert Hammond Jnr walked past me when I was brushing my teeth and said ‘hello’.. With a mouth full of Colgate and toothbrush, my reply was a muffled ‘hey’. There is the guitarist from The Strokes, walking past in his pristine cream suit, there’s me, unable to even say hello properly. It’s all about first impressions! Mind you, at least I will have minty fresh breath.

Another odd moment just now. I’m borrowing a desk in the ‘Artist Management’ office (they haven’t arrived at Mannheim yet). Someone comes up and asks me.. “Do you know where I can put fan mail?” umm.. I guess I just have to get used to these things.

I’m excited to see Albert Hammond Jnr as support. His band were great last night, and duly appreciated by the Strasbourg crowd. It was an open standing floor last night. It gives the gig a totally different feel. I like it when people can pick and choose their Coldplay experience.. almost touching distance, or dancing at the back. It gives the venue a buzz before the doors too, as the crowds wait patiently to rush to the front (even in torrential Strasbourg showers. It made me laugh when I saw them all oblivious to Jonny and Guy going for a run in the distance. That must have had them energised for the show. It was another great concert. Chris and Jonny pleasing the crowd by strutting down the catwalks for ’In My Place’. I have a feeling that it will only get better, as the tour rolls on. Lets hope Oxfam sign-ups keep going up too!

http://www.oxfamblogs.org/

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This review, translated from a German article [thanks Larry]
Coldplay in Mannheim: “Unbelievable!“

The Arena in Mannheim was full up under the roof - about 13,000 fans have came to see Coldplay in their prelude to the German tour with the new album “Viva la Vida”.

“Hello Mannheim, wie geht’s” - throughout the show Coldplay front man Chris Martin repeatedly talked with the fans, in German. And if all people sang along, Chris Martin said it’s “unglaubli(s)ch”. During the show he has lost three kilos certainly, as he exercised across the stage, dancing wildly and has even exploited every metre. “Life in Technicolor” - It began relatively quietly, as the band was still behind a transparent curtain with an enormous cover of the “Viva la Vida” album behind them. And then it went off: “Violet Hill”, “In My Place”, “Speed of Sound” - Coldplay didn’t stop a second! The concert was also pleasing to the eye: light effects, laser show, giant glowing balls above the stage on which the show has been transferred. The boys really came up with an idea. On the left and right the stage had two ramps down into the audience, on which Chris Martin and lead guitarist Jonny Buckland directly ran into the crowd. The fans were nearly able to touch them.

During “Viva la Vida” the hall became wildly enthusiastic

An absolute highlight of the show: “Viva la Vida” - completely everyone jumped up from their seats and the only thing you have seen were thousands of clapping and stretched out hands. The music mixture was very varied: with lots of extras, changing lighting effects, a changing stage design, a confetti of paper butterflies and an acoustic part of the band in the middle of the audience. Coldplay really kicked off an incredible prelude of their tour.

Source: http://www.swr3.de/musik/

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kay, here is my review, I hope you get what I`m saying because I´m a just 15-year old German girl that can`t speak real English

I went to this concert with my cousin and we arrived at 7.00h in Mannheim. There were really many people standing outside, but the arena was quite empty as we took our seats. We had seats on the right side of the stage (the perfect seats for a Jonny fan <3) and a quite good view.
The band playing before Coldplay was Albert Hammond Jr. (at least I think so, I`m not sure ). They were quite good but nothing special. After they left the stage, more people came in to the sold out arena and the crowd began to clap and scream and I was excited as hell

And then they came. Because I stood right to the stage I could see them even if they were standing behind the curtainJ. Unluckily the people next to me were boring, and so I was the only one standing and dancing the whole time. Life in Technicolor was great, the band was full of energy and they rocked instantly after they appeared on stage!
The next song was Violet Hill. The huge album cover was displayed behind them and everything was lighted in blue when the curtain was lift up. Clocks was great as usual, at first with red light, later with green spotlights. The following song was In my place and Chris was jumping all over the stage. Jonny walked to the small stage on the left. Chris said something like: “ Everybody okay? Thank you for coming out to the Coldplay concert on Tuesday evening, this is my best friend Jonny Buckland” and he…well…touched Jonny Then he lay on the ground while Jonny was playing above him <3
The next song was Cemeteries of London. I really hoped they would play it, because it`s one of my favourite song of VLV. J They used the magic balls the first time ( the big one in the middle was shining like a mirror ball), and everything was lighted in blue. I don`t understand why they didn`t play the song at the beginning of the tour, it´s amazing in the live version.
Yellow was following, and Chris was again jumping around. The big screen behind them showed Chris singing now and the end he asked the crowd:” Are you okay over there? Are you okay over there? Are okay down here?” again and again in every direction and said “Dankeschön” (Thank you).
The next song was 42, my favourite song of the album <3. Now not only the big screen but also the magic balls showed Chris singing at the slow part of the song. Then the stage was lighted in red and the screen showed all four band members in turn.
Speed of Sound followed and the whole crowed clapped. The magic balls shined in all colours and looked like they would spin. Chinese Sleep Chant is amazing live, too. The lights were all yellow and Chris stood near Guy while playing acoustic guitar (unfortunately I couldn`t see Chris kissing him, like some people said L ).
The next song was God put a smile upon your face with a crazy but cool guitar riff from Jonny. I`ve never heard the song in this version, but it`s great! Yes followed, as good as I expected it to be.
Then Chris went to the small stage on the left side of the main stage and played a wonderful acoustic version of Talk. I`d say it was better than the original version. He changed into Hardest Part, also acoustic and really beautiful. At the end he played a melody I´ve never heard before, it sounded like classical music and now I`ve got told that it was Postcards from far away (thanks to Lauve), but the song didn´t have lyrics
Chris stood up and began to sing Lost! And ask the crowd to get up, clap, sing and dance with him. Viva la vida wasthe next song, amazing (with a dancing Chris) as usual. The crowd loved the song and everybody sang the chorus as loud as they could. And they didn´t stop to sing while the band went to the back of the arena to play an acoustic version of the Scientist ( the band had to wait until the crowd stopped singing). Unluckily I couldn`t see them anymore L. Death will never conquer followed and I have to admit that Will is a great singer, he has a lovely voice!
The band came back to the main stage in the dark and we could hear an incredible version of Talk that sounded a bit like techno to me. Politik was the next song. The big magic ball in the middle looked like the earth while everything around was dark – beautiful. Lovers in Japan started in violet light and with this strange film on the screen behind the stage. Everyone went crazy when the butterflies came down the first time, the second kind of butterflies shone in the dark.
The next song was Death an all his friends with a big“Viva”on the screen. Chris said:” Thank you for this Tuesday evening” and the rest can`t be described with words . The band took a bow, went behind the stage and came back with Fix you. Chris jumped and ran around like he was crazy and the crowd was blown away. At the end Chris said: ” Bis bald!” (See you soon). The escapist was the final song and while Chris was singing, the magic ball showed the Oxfam logo.

Everybody got out the arena quickly, some people where still singing Viva la Vida, and I went down to the floor to get me a few butterflies. Outside the arena many people stood in front of the merchandising shop (me too) and bought t-shirts. I got a Shirt for 30 € (everything was extremely expensive L), a poster and the wonderful Tourbook with amazing pictures J. When we got back to our car, the people were still singing!

[thanks *Becky*]

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Now was it finally so far! 2 September came and Coldplay are appearing in the SAP arena in Mannheim with their “Viva La Vida” tour. In the sold out SAP arena,
approx. 11,000 visitors were offered a unique picture. The show Coldplay delivered here was magnificent! The sound, lighting, and video technicians really understand the music to combine light and scenery in such a way as I have ever seen before. The concert was actually a journey through all the Coldplay albums, with the band playing hits “Clocks” to “Viva La Vida”.

With the Intro, after the hall had darkened and a kind of semi-seethrough curtain hung before the stage, the tape started playing on the stage, and you could only see their silhouettes illuminated from the rear by spotlights. The perfect staging was also supported by “balls” , on the inside of which videos were projected (the audience or films). The climax however was during the song “Lovers in Japan”, during which thousands of paper butterflies rained down on the audience. Coldplay delivered an image, which I could not myself have imagined better. The high entry price has unambiguously been worthwhile, and I would do it over and over again anyway!

[translated by Jenjie with assistance from Babelfish & translation2]

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VIDEO

Spiegel News report [thanks MacPhisto]

LIFE IN TECHNICOLOR [thanks guilelumi]

VIOLET HILL

CLOCKS [thanks LasVegas200709]

CEMETERIES OF LONDON [thanks LasVegas200709]

CHINESE SLEEP CHANT

GOD PUT A SMILE UPON YOUR FACE

YES

YELLOW [thanks izzarshah]

42 [thanks watermark260783]

42 [thanks guilelumi]

TROUBLE

TALK/THE HARDEST PART [thanks thekooksfan91]

Another snippet of TALK [thanks sue910] Nice to see this song back in the setlist…

IN MY PLACE [thanks Flo!]

SPEED OF SOUND

VIVA LA VIDA [thanks watermark260783]

Another version [thanks izzarshah]

LOST! [thanks guilelumi]

THE SCIENTIST [thanks matrixsreal]

DEATH WILL NEVER CONQUER

POLITIK

LOVERS IN JAPAN [thanks watermark260783]

DEATH AND ALL HIS FRIENDS

FIX YOU [excellent vid - thanks matrixsreal]

Another version [thanks SanCassius]

THE ESCAPIST