Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends

Earlier this year, Britons voted Coldplay as The Band Most Likely to Put You to Sleep. The poll, conducted by hotel chain Travelodge, had Chris Martin & Co. beating out aural Ambien including James Blunt and Norah Jones. Even for a band known to take solace in their overarching pleasantness, the drowsy coronation doubled as a harsh insult. After all, Coldplay is a rock band. A grandma-friendly, Radiohead-normalizing, disarmingly polite rock band led by a man who sounds like he's still yearning for puberty perhaps...but a rock band nonetheless. After proving their stadium bona fides with 2002's bristling A Rush of Blood to the Head, these wuss messiahs fattened up with X&Y, a startlingly bland affair that even forced eternally level-headed New York Times critic Jon Pareles to dub them "the most insufferable band of the decade." The Travelodge survey indicated this considerate foursome wasn't even keeping people awake long enough to piss them off anymore. So Coldplay did what any U2 acolytes worth a chiming guitar chord would do-- they went off to "rip it up and start again." But Viva isn't a complete overhaul á la Achtung Baby or Kid A; just as they dull the sharp corners of their legendary influences musically, Coldplay offer a diluted version of the "experimental" mid-career maneuver with their fourth LP. It's a case of well-honed troubleshooting that should keep the faithful conscious enough to appreciate its subtle improvements.

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