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Rachel D. said:
I'm in the same mailing list and had the same reaction. There are an awful lot of coincidences. For instance, U2 had Anton Corbijn direct the video "New Year's Day," from their third album. Coldplay had Anton Corbijn direct the video for "Talk," from their third album. U2 had Eno/Lanois produce their fourth album; Coldplay is having Eno/Lanois produce their fourth album (or is it just one of them?). Chris Martin appears to have some kind of Big Book of Bono Quotes; he also imitated Bono's going-into-the-crowd routine when Coldplay performed at the Grammies a couple of years ago. Now Coldplay is trying to add some Christian themes into their music (according to the author of the article). That's a lot of "coincidences"! I think they're a good band and all, but such blatent imitation is pathetic, even though it seems to be working well for them (not surprisingly).

Frankly, I'm surprised so many of you are standing up for Coldplay.
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Anton Corbijn has directed a shit load of videos for Depeche Mode. James has had Brian Eno produce at least 2 albums. Iggy Pop INVENTED stage diving. Bob Dylan has produced an entire Christian album. And your point is?
 
kingofsorrow said:
and as we all know bono has never "borrowed" from anyone else.
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yeah, some are just more obvious then others. You can use terms like love,hearts,kneel;) a little bit more loosely then a lyric as odd as " banks feel like cathedrals"
I mean come on mix it up a bit, maybe he could have used
" sub-prime mortgage lenders become churches"

It's all good though U2 will have the last laugh when their new album comes out and their first single is called "Jello"

Yeah, they were all jello.
I came along,
I wrote a song for you,
And all the things you do,
And it was called jello
 
zoo99 said:
I will say I was more then a little surprised when I heard the new Coldplay single and Chris uses the lyric
"When the banks became cathedrals " .
Maybe its just me and this line orginated before Playboy Mansion's " The banks feel like cathedrals" but man that is weak and I am a huge Coldplay fan.
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«A man builds a city with banks and cathedrals»
The idea is not the same, but the game with these two words is already there.
 
Come on guys, we're not saying that U2 never borrowed anything from anyone. Of course they did it. But they took little things from here, other little things from there, etc...
Not as Coldplay have been doing. I remain to think that all these coincidences that were listed here are ridiculous and they'll make me loose respect for Coldplay. They are a good band. If so, why can't they be original and make things for theirselves.
 
U2387 said:
U2 is a very original band.

[...]

Coldplay, so far, has merely shown that they can TRY to imitate the sound from ATYCLB and to a much lesser extent, HTDAAB.
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Echo and the Bunnymen were doing the "sound from ATYCLB" three years before U2 or Coldplay...
 
How about when Coldplay wrote the song for Johnny Cash last tour? And they do the little "unplugged" segment in the middle of the show when they come out front in the audience?

What about the videos for Speed of Sound and City Of Blinding Lights? Which came out first?
Similar? I think so.

Actually, musically they sound much more like a lite version of Radiohead then U2.
 
U2girl said:
Contemporaries, how awful.
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But aren't Coldplay and U2 currently "contemporaries" in a musical sense, just as much as U2 and the Bunnymen were contemporaries in the early 80s? As people in this thread have been quick to point out, the typical Coldplay "sound" is nothing like U2's earlier work, and is rather more like ATYCLB/HTDAAB. You can't blame them for wanting to work with Eno or Corbijn - they're both brilliant in their respective fields. Who WOULDN'T want to work with them?

I'm not defending Coldplay's music (I think most of it's rather crap, to be honest, and I can't stand Chris Martin.) I simply get irritated when I see people getting into a huff over bands imitating U2 or being heavily inspired by them, when U2 are just as guilty of the same things. Not that inspiration is really anything to feel guilty about in the first place. There are very few artists out there who have produced anything that is truly unique. It's only wrong when it's outright plagiarism.
 
JOFO said:
How about when Coldplay wrote the song for Johnny Cash last tour? And they do the little "unplugged" segment in the middle of the show when they come out front in the audience?

What about the videos for Speed of Sound and City Of Blinding Lights? Which came out first?
Similar? I think so.

Actually, musically they sound much more like a lite version of Radiohead then U2.
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U2 invented the whole idea of tribute songs for revered artists, did they? I didn't know that!
 
GibsonGirl said:


But aren't Coldplay and U2 currently "contemporaries" in a musical sense, just as much as U2 and the Bunnymen were contemporaries in the early 80s? As people in this thread have been quick to point out, the typical Coldplay "sound" is nothing like U2's earlier work, and is rather more like ATYCLB/HTDAAB. You can't blame them for wanting to work with Eno or Corbijn - they're both brilliant in their respective fields. Who WOULDN'T want to work with them?

I'm not defending Coldplay's music (I think most of it's rather crap, to be honest, and I can't stand Chris Martin.) I simply get irritated when I see people getting into a huff over bands imitating U2 or being heavily inspired by them, when U2 are just as guilty of the same things. Not that inspiration is really anything to feel guilty about in the first place. There are very few artists out there who have produced anything that is truly unique. It's only wrong when it's outright plagiarism.
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In a way yes, though to me "contemporary" means two bands making music and evolving at the same time and coming up with similar sounds, as Bunnymen and U2 did. Coldplay is borrowing of a band that started their career 30 years ago. :shrug:

I think the reason Coldplay is getting blamed is because they so obviously borrow from U2. I don't think people would talk about them using Eno or Corbijn if Coldplay's idols didn't do the exact same thing. It's - and I like Coldplay's music - getting hard to see where "we're Coldplay" begins and "we're just like U2!" ends. It doesn't help that Chris Martin is - maybe media hype isn't helping matters either - trying to be "Bono 2.0", that 90% or more of Buckland's playing sounds a lot like something Edge would come up with. They even had a giant JT poster in the studio during the making of X and Y (and I think I saw something about African influences on their new album). Yes, U2 did borrow from others, but it was never as blatant and they still managed to make it *U2* in the end.
 
elevated_u2_fan said:
I can't remember on account of not caring at the time, did people bitch and complain as much in the early 80's?
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No, because the internet wasn't around, and it takes way too much time and energy to do your griping via snail mail. :wink:
 
People like making a competition. Can't like Coldpay AND U2. Can't like Oasis AND Blur. Can't like The Who AND Zeppelin. Can't like the Stones AND the Beatles. :huh:
 
GibsonGirl said:


But aren't Coldplay and U2 currently "contemporaries" in a musical sense, just as much as U2 and the Bunnymen were contemporaries in the early 80s? As people in this thread have been quick to point out, the typical Coldplay "sound" is nothing like U2's earlier work, and is rather more like ATYCLB/HTDAAB. You can't blame them for wanting to work with Eno or Corbijn - they're both brilliant in their respective fields. Who WOULDN'T want to work with them?

I'm not defending Coldplay's music (I think most of it's rather crap, to be honest, and I can't stand Chris Martin.) I simply get irritated when I see people getting into a huff over bands imitating U2 or being heavily inspired by them, when U2 are just as guilty of the same things. Not that inspiration is really anything to feel guilty about in the first place. There are very few artists out there who have produced anything that is truly unique. It's only wrong when it's outright plagiarism.
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Agreed 100% Stephanie. Except it's plagiation, not plagiarism.

You should know better. :tsk:
 
personally I don't really care what Coldplay do
they could call their next album "Achtung babies" and I still wouldn't be interested

I do have some suspicions though that some people here who now feel like sticking up for Coldplay would, remarkably enough, be dumping on U2 if they'd be able to convince themselves that U2 sort of copied 1 other bands "career choices" in an equal way
 
I think a few of my words are getting twisted around. Coldplay are allowed to want to work with Eno; I just think it was very calculated to make sure they got him for the 4th album and they probably (I have nothing to back it up) sat him down and said "Do with us, what you did with U2".

I'm just saying: Yes, U2 may have followed in the footsteps of their idols...but who can tell? I mean, name one band that they look/sound/act like. I know I can't. They are so incredibly innovative that it has overshadowed anything that may have come before them. To me, U2's music is built on the basis of trying to get away from sounding like anyone else (even themselves). That is their appeal.

Now, look at Coldplay...who else are they trying to be but U2 at this point? If they didn't make it so blatently obvious, they'd be having a better chance at success, in my opinion. They could be taken a lot more seriously by people like me.

I was never saying people shouldn't take ideas from their idols; I'm just saying "borrow" ideas, don't "steal". Art is only imitation to an extent. Then again, if people didn't like repetition and imitation, we wouldn't have most of the songs on the radio that we do now (Ahh, wouldn't that be nice).
 
I really hate everyone taking the piss out on Coldplay. Sure, they may be boring at points, and Chris Martin's voice may be limited in range and with an over-usage of falsetto. But someone once told it to me this way: U2's trying to change the world with their music. Coldplay's just laying in the shade of a tree on a sunny day, relaxing. Coldplay is like daydreaming, while U2 is more dreaming out loud.

It was a cliche statement by my friend, but it's true. Who cares about their business practices? They don't sound that much like U2. They may want to. Who knows? But they don't. They do their own thing. And I'm cool with that.
 
Rich79 said:



Now, look at Coldplay...who else are they trying to be but U2 at this point? If they didn't make it so blatently obvious, they'd be having a better chance at success, in my opinion. They could be taken a lot more seriously by people like me.
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I don't think they need to worry about that... Coldplay are hugely successful, at least here in Europe, and what does 'people like me' mean exactly?
 
For the folks that are ironically arguing that «ohhh, and U2 never borrowed anything from anyone, nah...», I'm gonna quote myself:

Aygo said:
Come on guys, we're not saying that U2 never borrowed anything from anyone. Of course they did it. But they took little things from here, other little things from there, and never stopped from being different and being theirselves, being unique.
Not as Coldplay have been doing. I remain to think that all these coincidences that were listed in this thread here are ridiculous (in number and in meaning) and they'll make me loose respect for Coldplay. They are a good band. If so, why can't they be original and make things for theirselves.
Click to expand...
 
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