From the archives: Consciously uncoupling myself from Coldplay

As traumatic experiences go, this has got to rank up there with mislaying your house keys or losing your mum in the supermarket. There’s a high likelihood that I could be scarred for life.  I still wake up screaming in the middle of the night.

There’s no easy way to say this, so I’m not going to insult your intelligence by dressing it up: I found a Coldplay single in my record collection. Yep. There it was, nestled between Cold Water Flat and Collapsed Lung (Google ‘em both), just waiting to be found at an opportune moment.

I took some consolation from two facts: firstly, it came free with an issue of NME back in 2008, so I didn’t pay for it as such and, secondly, I’ve never actually listened to it. I must have removed it from the cover of said magazine all those years ago, filed it away (alphabetically, of course) and forgotten about it.

Unearthing it after six apparently Coldplay-free years brought up a lot of feelings – guilt, anger, shame, disappointment. How had I let my guard down so spectacularly? How could I look people in the eye again? How could I even step out of the house in the morning?

Thankfully, the solution came to me quicker than you can say ‘conscious uncoupling’.

What follows is a handy step-by-step guide to purging unwanted pests of the Chris Martin variety:

1. Remove the offending record from your collection. Gaze upon it briefly to ensure it is indeed a Coldplay record and not something worth keeping. I checked Discogs to ensure that it wasn’t valuable and therefore worth selling. Thankfully, it was only worth £1.79 (less than I paid for the magazine, I think) so I could proceed with my original plan.

2. Take a bowl – ideally one that the record is too big to fit inside. You may gaze upon the bowl too if you wish but a bowl’s a bowl, so don’t waste valuable purgin’ time.

3. Place the Coldplay record on top of the bowl in the sink and boil the kettle. Once boiled, pour the contents of the kettle onto the record.

4. Bearing in mind boiling water and human fingers don’t really mix, use your fingers (or another suitable appendage/implement) to push what should now be a very soft record into the bowl, so that it bunches up (alternatively, you could push another similar-sized bowl down on top of it to make, um, another bowl, but I didn’t think of this until afterwards).

5. Hey presto! You’ve made a nifty piece of modern art, which already serves more purpose in this fetid existence than anything Chris Martin has ever emitted from his self-righteous face hole.

6. Take comfort in the fact that there is now one less playable Coldplay record in the world. That’s one less person suffering. You’ve done something amazing today. This also works with anything by Bastille, by the way.

It’s taken a lot of courage to share this, but I don’t want others going through similar experiences to think they are suffering alone. I’m in your corner. 

Originally published on It Is Happening Again on June 5, 2014.

From the archives: People like Coldplay and voted for the Nazis. You can’t trust people.

It’s a cold December evening, somewhere between Christmas and New Year, and we’ve returned to the pub we frequented as teenagers, only now we’re actual grown-ups in our 30s.

We’re playing darts. Nothing too serious, but we’re all agreed that getting the arrows to stick in the right numbers still counts for something. Talk turns to music and, specifically, our bafflement at the continuing success of Emeli Sande, despite the fact that her recorded output is about as exciting as regrouting a shower.

“Music for people who don’t like music,” says one of my friends to nods and general murmurs of approval.

“Coffee table music,” I add, to yet more approval, “like Dido.”

I’m feeling over-confident now. This is it. I’m going to hit the ball right out of the park with my next comment. This will define the evening. Here I go.

“And Coldplay!”

Pause. Silence. The rest of the group turn to face me with a collective look that says one thing: I’ve gone too far this time.

“Ah, Coldplay are okay,” says one, and then with the tone of someone trying to deter a school bully from beating up a smaller kid: “Leave them alone.”

Another chips in: “Coldplay have done at least five or six amazing songs.”

I can’t believe my ears. I’ve misheard them. I MUST HAVE MISHEARD THEM.

“But, but… Coldplay?!” – that’s all I can muster. I’m not going to win this one. But it gets me thinking: why, exactly, do I detest Chris Martin and the three other blokes who aren’t Chris Martin so much?

Is it because their songs always sound half-finished, promising something they never deliver? Is it because I’d gain more musical fulfilment from watching an old grey coat for an hour? Is it because of Yellow, where Chris describes things being ‘all yellow’ in the manner of an eight-year-old reading a prayer in school assembly, or that mind-numbingly boring accompanying video where he – get this – walks along a freezing beach for a few minutes (if ever a video accurately represented a song)? Is it the band’s name, which sounds like the sort of word you’d come up with to cheat at Scrabble? Is it the fact that no one would have given a shit about Coldplay had they emerged at the height of Britpop and that their early success was probably really only down to good timing? What about the way Chris used to write slogans on his hands and wrap tape around his fingers like some sort of apologetic messiah? Or do they just make music for people who don’t like… oh, hang on.

I don’t think I can pinpoint a single reason. It’s probably all of those and probably none of them too. If there’s one thing I can be sure of, however, it’s that I definitely hated Coldplay before it was fashionable to do so, regardless of whether or not I had a valid reason.

Maybe one day I’ll work out exactly why I don’t like them, or perhaps I’ll eventually lose my mind and admit that, yeah, they’re okay. Shoot me.

Until then, my friends and I are going to have to agree to disagree. 

Originally published on It Is Happening Again on January 6, 2014.