Artist: Coldplay
Label: EMI Records
Release: 2012
Running time: approx. 110 min. (DVD) / approx. 70 min. (CD)
Rating: 4.5/5
The third concert release from Coldplay, those alternative rock darlings who have so slyly infiltrated the »global music mainstream«, is simply titled »Live 2012« and captures the band’s current live spirit as they wrap up promotion for their latest studio album, »Mylo Xyloto«. After the festival tour in the summer of 2011 came a massive run of shows promoting »Mylo Xyloto« in venues of all sizes. They range from rooms that hold a few thousand heads, as the footage from the Parisian indoor hall La Cigale for the song Violet Mill proves, all the way up to those megalomaniacal arenas with capacities of 10,000+. From October 2011 to the end of September 2012, Coldplay were putting in the hard touring yards for »Mylo Xyloto«!
Coldplay generally played 23 songs at these shows, and the concerts ran an hour and three quarters. The DVD runs almost that long, but Coldplay didn’t put the whole setlist on it, only a selection. The best-known points of their career and the highlights of the new album »Mylo Xyloto«. The gaps are filled with four documentary intermissions that combine in-depth commentary from all the band members with special documentary footage, taking the viewer straight to the heart of the tour itself.
Most of the DVD tracks capture the evening in Paris, where Coldplay sold out the giant Stade De France on 02.09.2012. The stage design owes a lot, idea-wise, to the legacy of the concert spectacles that Pink Floyd defined long ago, especially when you see the spotlights mounted on giant circular wheels, and the laser beam games are also a well-established, tried-and-tested trick first tried by Pink Floyd. On the tour the band also handed out fluorescent flashing wristbands in different colors, which the audience slipped onto their wrists, and the effect came across best at the Paris stadium show, which gives this DVD its own distinctive stamp and character. A special moment is Chris Martin’s address to the Paris crowd during a break, where he lies on the floor of the »catwalk« looking up into the camera filming him from above. He says he’d like to see all the wristband-wearing hands raised high in the air. Order carried out, the band launches into Charlie Brown, and the hypnosis of audio-visual effects they’ve created is one of a kind. The hypnotic power of the combined audio-visual effect of the new super hit Paradise is also an experience of its own. Picture a clear, calm night, thousands of wristbands flickering in it, a simple, banally trivial swaying rhythm carried on the wings of an excellent curtain of mellotrons. The mellotrons then make way for Martin’s piano at the moment the guy wins over the crowd all over again with his trademark vocals in the song’s grabbing lead melody.
Us Against The World comes from the Montreal stage at the Bell Centre in Canada – with an improvised stage set up at the opposite end of the main stage structure, it serves up a one-of-a-kind acoustic-flavored experience on the DVD, since the guys are right there in the audience’s faces. Yellow and Minor Minus come from the show at the Madrid venue Piaza De Toros De Las Ventas in Spain, while Viva La Vida caught the vibe of the Glastonbury festival stage in England. The choice of the Glastonbury version of Viva La Vida, which superbly bridges the native folk engraving of Celtic culture and Coldplay’s indie rock starting points, couldn’t have been better. A wide field where there’s no end to the heads is full of fluttering flags, symbolically tied one way or another to heartfelt English patriotism. It’s a moment of the DVD that’s especially intensely charged with the emotion of the devoted British audience, and as such it creates one of the film’s standout atmospheric moments. The bridge between Coldplay and the crowd is exceptional at this point.
Along with the DVD, an audio CD is included in this release. The track list on the audio disc is actually identical to the DVD, with only Violet Mill left out – you’ll find that only on the DVD. Logically, the band’s commentary has been cut from the audio disc, and it runs about half an hour shorter than the DVD’s playing time. For those of you who want to enjoy just the magic of the music, especially on a night drive in the car, the audio disc is an indispensable daily bonus!
Otherwise, the megalomaniacal production hasn’t missed by an inch in its mission. Money buys everything, and Coldplay, in their profession and professional attitude, leave nothing to chance. The additional wide, spacious »catwalk« into the heart of the floor is skillfully used by the mega hits Princess Of China and, right after it, the heart-caressing Up In Flames (both from the Paris stadium), and Rihanna’s guest appearance adds its own plus points to this release. In such an environment the band can’t help but feel fantastic, in a rush they themselves can hardly explain, they describe. Sharing that energy must be a unique and priceless experience. Even though we don’t get the entire concert recording in one piece, the film has captured the key, integral turns of the mood of the tour’s concert nights, which conjure up, quite successfully, several faces of Coldplay’s greatness – and that definitely confirms the guys are riding the wings of their creative and commercial peak. Coldplay play excellently, they don’t slip in their interpretation of the material or in their stage performance, and they’re in top form – you could say in their years of greatest bloom. The power of charisma, steeped in the confident bearing of every step, every movement, every well-tuned note, every well-tuned address to the crowd, is exceptional and justifies the band’s position in the league of the biggest, meaning those who shape the current global music mainstream!
Lineup
Chris Martin – vocals, guitar, keyboards
Jonny Buckland – guitar
Guy Berryman – bass guitar
Will Champion – drums
Production
Jim Parsons
Track list
CD:
1. Mylo Xyloto
2. Hurts Like Heaven
3. In My Place
4. Major Minus
5. Yellow
6. God Put a Smile Upon Your Face
7. Princess of China
8. Up in Flames
9. Viva La Vida
10. Charlie Brown
11. Paradise
12. Us Against the World
13. Clocks
14. Fix You
15. Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall
DVD:
1. Live 2012 – Menu Loops
2. Opening Credits (Us Against the World)
3. Mylo Xyloto
4. Hurts Like Heaven
5. In My Place
6. Intermission 1
7. Major Minus
8. Yellow
9. Intermission 2
10. Violet Hill
11. God Put a Smile Upon Your Face
12. Princess of China
13. Intermission 3
14. Up in Flames
15. Viva La Vida
16. Intermission 4
17. Charlie Brown
18. Paradise
19. Us Against the World
20. Clocks
21. Intermission 5
22. Fix You
23. Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall
24. End Credits (Up With the Birds)
25. The Scientist
26. Don’t Let It Break Your Heart
