Coldplay - Ghost Stories (out 5/19/204)

COLDPLAY REVEAL THE VIDEO FOR THEIR NEW SINGLE, "MAGIC"
The Song Is Taken From Their New Album, Ghost Stories, Releasing On May 19
Watch The Video Now

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qtb11P1FWnc

Coldplay have revealed the video for their new single, "Magic." The single is currently available on iTunes.

The video was directed by Jonas Åkerlund, and stars Ziyi Zhang (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) as a magician, with Chris Martin doubling up as both her loyal assistant and brutish husband.

"Magic" is taken from Coldplay's new album, Ghost Stories, which will be released on May 19 on Parlophone/Atlantic Records. The album can be pre-ordered now from iTunes worldwide at itunes.com/coldplay.

The full Ghost Stories tracklisting is as follows:

1. Always In My Head
2. Magic
3. Ink
4. True Love
5. Midnight
6. Another's Arms
7. Oceans
8. A Sky Full Of Stars
9. O

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5Adx0RXpvg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8umNOkhqWRw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhJQL6CqOMw

And now there are three ... magic!!!!

Now watch me turn that song into ... this one!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0Kv6vxZwL8&feature=kp

More magic!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWphoQMIIco

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfvlV63NEY0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2MuzO3WLmA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BC3JFX6Yk5E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTb5RrZpocc

oh no, what's this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0yxmthyD5U

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGXMzxpVaFA

lotta sadness in this world

it is likely i am the only person in the world who thinks "Magic" is really top shelf Coldplay

i totally think so too, ship

haha it's fucking awful

awwww i always love sharing a challop canoe with brad

song and video would be so much better and so much closer to what they want and need to be if you replaced chris martin w/ norah jones

video is pretty bad, i will say that.

I actually like the other song they released better -- Midnight. Moody album track stuff.

Coldplay's, er, clockwork dedication to the 3-year album/tour/album cycle seems a gambit to maintain momentum-derived arena status above all else, inspiration/quality of product be damned. This band wouldn't dare disappear for much longer than that.

bands make albums. i don't begrudge any of 'em for doing that regularly, whether they're good or not. what else are they gonna do?

Take some time off to make a better one?

Eh I don't think there's any consistent relationship between time spent and the quality of results. And even if there was, 3 years is not 'rushing the creative process' by any stretch of the imagination.

lotta sadness in this world

― balls, Monday, April 7, 2014

fuckin' a.

speaking of better songs named "magic"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvfE-Cf9Qcc&feature=kp

song and video would be so much better and so much closer to what they want and need to be if you replaced chris martin w/ norah jones

Similar thought but was thinking Sade.

I dunno, the tour/record/tour model is not bad, but given this band spends so much time on both I wonder if Martin, already under a lot of pressure, might find it easier aiming for the middle than going for anything ambitious. But then, I don't know who writes the songs.

All these "Magic" videos and not a single link to Pilot? Wow.

I actually quite enjoy the Coldplay song (even the little falsetto sections), better than "Midnight" for sure. Seeing mustachioed Chris Martin pretty much ruins the video, though

omg what the fuck is with Martin's staccato game on this track. he sounds like a guy at karaoke night imitating Jakob Dylan in the verse

My understanding from a few years ago is that Martin writes all the songs.

he writes the songs that make the young girls sing
he writes the songs of conscious uncoupling
he writes the songs that make yeezy cry
he writes the songs he writes the songs

I don't buy the idea that taking more time off would produce better records. If anything they should work faster and take more risks than the three-year cycle allows.

yeah, if you can't make your best possible record in 3 years, i fail to see how year 4 or year 5 is gonna hold the special breakthrough moment. that's Axl Rose thinking.

I never said they should take longer in the studio. Just that they take more time off between albums. Like a long break or hiatus.

Different people work in different ways, and the more successful an established pattern is (however you gauge 'success') the more difficult it is to break that pattern. The 3-year cycle certainly seems to work commercially for Coldplay, and with that in mind I imagine it'd be very hard for Martin to break out of it and do something else that might encourage more creative rewards, even if he'd like to.

I wonder how the chorus to 'O' goes.

yeah, if you can't make your best possible record in 3 years, i fail to see how year 4 or year 5 is gonna hold the special breakthrough moment. that's Axl Rose thinking.

Oh, you know, fewer diapers, wife out of the house.

what's funny is there was a whole thing where EMI Group publicly blamed their falling profits in 2004 on the fact that Coldplay (and also Gorillaz) had pushed their release date back to 2005, so it's not like the music industry ever told the band "yes, 3 years is fine, take your time"

Oh, no doubt. You can tell from interviews that Martin wants to take off. He'll end a tour with "this is the last you'll see from us for a while, we're taking some time off." And then 6 months later the machine has ramped up again. How can we miss you, Coldplay, if you don't go away? That's why I mentioned the band's tenuous grasp on arenas. They're at that level, but I suspect only if the machine is kept in motion. If the group took too long, there would not be a loud cry for more Coldplay. Dunno how much people clamor for new U2 albums, either, but then, U2 has a couple of decades on Coldplay. And they play bigger places, too.

I don't see much evidence that long breaks are good for arena bands. They've not been doing U2 or RHCP any favours. Normally they're a clue that the good songs aren't coming so easily anymore.

That's probably true. But also the bigger the band the longer everything takes and the more people are involved and the more work is required to maintain the machine. So I suspect what may appear from our vantage as "breaks" may in fact be much busier than they seem. With no doubt a lot of pressure on Martin to deliver the goods, which may be why he (and, hey, U2 and RHCP) have belatedly stuck to a more commercial model in recent years. Ironically, for them, I bet the firmer template of commercial music (hits are likely another thing) eases things up. If you're working with Danger Mouse or Will.I. Am, or Rick Rubin in a certain mode, it provides a safety net. In Coldplay's case, it's been firmly embracing MOR whereas previously the band was kind of MOR by default, if you accept the distinction.

Like, there's easy listening, and then there's easy to listen to.

so because they won't let me listen to this on Spotify. is there anyone out there who thinks this album is any good?

I bought it last night at Target (3 bonus tracks!), and have only made it 3-4 songs in so far, but I like it. It's enjoyable on headphones (not earbuds, actual headphones); the bass frequencies are very pleasurable. I have paid absolutely no attention to the lyrics, but the vocal melodies are nice and there are some cool backing vocals and tweaks to Martin's voice. I'll probably listen to the rest of it tomorrow.

i can't hear "magic" without imagining it sung by an exaggeratedly cliche bob dylan impersonator

Basically sounds like a Chris Martin solo album. Slow, smudgy and solipsistic except for one terrible bit of EDM lite. Beautifully produced though, like a gift-wrapped box with nothing in it.

This
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zp7NtW_hKJI

sounds a lot like this cover they were doing a couple of years ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYHD4g04zQQ

am i the only person who thinks "Magic" is a top 5 Coldplay song? i'm pretty lukewarm on the rest of the album though.

― some dude, Saturday, September 20, 2014 8:11 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I like "Magic" but I like "Midnight" better, in all its Bon Iverish woodland critter glory

I like Magic so and so but I truly find this band repulsive. I can't help it. I know there's bands more deserving of the hate but everytime I overhear them I just feel like punching their music in the face. I'm pretty sure it's Chris Martin's voice.

Hello again. We're pleased to report that the band's current album, Ghost Stories, is now available to hear in full on all major streaming services worldwide. Click on your preferred service to listen to the album now:

- Spotify
- Deezer
- Rdio

Of course, if you'd rather own the album, it's available from the links below:

There are a lot of Coldplay threads. Is there a primary Coldplay thread? Anyway, this is as good as any, because this album is one of the five Coldplay albums I've never heard, with another one I won't hear coming out this month. Or maybe it is already out? Who can tell. I was reading the short New Yorker profile from the always reliable Petrusich, and it was there that I learned that a) there is a new album and b) the band claims it will no longer record after making two more records, just tour? Who even makes a worthless announcement like that?

coldplay, on a near constant basis (this feels like the third or fourth time they’ve vowed to stop recording albums, once they vowed to stop touring)

this album is ok but viva la vida is still the best

I heard the new album yesterday. I hadn't listened to a Coldplay album in a decade (the last one I heard was Ghost Stories). My immediate takeaway was that anyone who thinks no-show jobs are just a mob thing, let me tell you, the Other Guys In Coldplay are absolute *masters* of the grift. Having heard "their" new album, I'm sorry, it sounded like Chris Martin, a few guest vocalists, and a million dollars worth of ProTools expertise.

I am falling asleep just reading the description of the music

this isn't even the first time martin's made that claim - he said a decade ago that they were only going to release 7 albums and now he's saying it'll only be 12 albums. there was a similar silly justification to last time too - there are only 12 beatles albums (a decade ago it was that there are only 7 harry potter books), and that he thinks they wouldn't be able to keep the quality control up if they made more (lol)

ghost stories is one of their better albums though

Just retire and buy an island and don’t bother anyone

the only one that's remotely worth a listen since ghost stories is everyday life which was a surprisingly solid spiritual successor to vlv, they're ultimately much better at being an art rock-lite band than a full-on pop one

I tried vlv again a few months ago and musically it was fine, but the lyrics are a cringy binfire.

Also the album titles are just parodies now. Music of the Spheres. Moon Music. wtf

it’s a cool cover and they’re a good Shoegaze band, will check this out

Went in expecting what I got, and get from most* modern Coldplay albums - some good tracks, some bad tracks. They are pretty good at filling their Stadium Ambient quota and they do that on like 3 tracks here - the best being the rainbow one. The only pop song that made much of an impression was Aeterna.

*Everyday Life, really solid on the whole, is the exception

When I was looking up which Coldplay albums I'd not heard (and never will hear, tbh, despite being a modest fan of the first four) I noticed that just about every track on "Mylo Xyloto" was co-written *but not produced* by Eno. I'm not sure that's ever been the case for any Eno project. Even the Berlin trilogy, Eno gets co-writer credit on just a relative few of the songs, not counting the instrumental stuff.

Classic:

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/articles/coldplay-kiss-cam-exposes-astronomer-142620411.html

Coldplay’s Kiss Cam Exposes Astronomer’s CEO Andy Byron Alleged Affair With HR Chief Kristin Cabot

more like Hotplay amirite

Bryon's statement is HILARIOUS peak-entitlement vibes of someone who has never been held accountable in their entire life and lives their life off a corporate script.

I hope his soon to be ex-wife gets paid in full.

Apparently that statement that's been circulating is fake, he hasn't actually made a statement yet.

lol at “Either they’re having an affair or…”

I just wanna say that if there's one thing that brought us all together from the daily atrocities was making fun of this CEO doofus. How dare he use "Astronomer" for his b.s. data aggragator, (insert Lloyd Bentsen quote)

The most delightful (?) thing about all this was me being prompted to wonder, in that I don't think about the band at all, "Have they always had the same lineup?" Indeed so but: there's a fifth member who is sorta their vibes guy and a once and future manager who's been there nearly the whole time aside from an early to mid 2000s break:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phil_Harvey_(band_manager)

The key info here being that they all met in college when this dude "played bass for The Rockin' Honkies, a group that performed soul and R&B covers."

I’m sorry, the who

lmao

https://bsky.app/profile/notphillies.bsky.social/post/3lubrjgrgnn2l

I was taking a shit at work in a stall when I heard a dude talking about his weekend trip to this shit band and I was like bro are you for real

*see

Can’t decide if being caught cheating is worse than being caught attending a coldplay concert.

The affair I can forgive, but...Coldplay?!?

(says the spouse)

cultural bankruptcy

I’m sorry, the who

Imagine being a non-playing member of Coldplay and somehow NOT having that be the most embarrassing thing on your c.v.

I laughed I cried pic.twitter.com/u4CWubF5Ze

— Congolesa Rice (@judeinlondon) July 19, 2025

Phanatic rules

I was taking a shit at work in a stall

As opposed to the sink?

amazing that this guy thought "maybe if I duck down no one will see me" and within 24 hours Major League Baseball teams were making fun of him

They're playing here tonight, and I simply cannot fathom that there are 60,000 people who are the kind of people who would go see Coldplay.

Resigned!

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/andy-byron-astronomer-board-investigation-coldplay-kiss-cam-video/

Also what kind of band has a kiss cam?

lol at the guy with the “this is my wife” sign can relate

again, “Coldplay kiss cam” is doing my head in.

Nothing says “it’s time to make out” than “clocks” right ???

Should be replaced by a “for those about to rock”

_claps claps claps claps claps_

_I was taking a shit at work in a stall _

As opposed to the sink?

Well, yeah

Coldplay is foreplay music for YIMBYs (unless it's a homeless shelter), zero surprise at a kiss cam

As opposed to the sink?

Some years ago I posted this, but there's another option that I wish some people would stop taking.

Not guilty

my son likes a few Coldplay songs and is such a lovely guy, so I say fuck all the haters

my son likes a few Coldplay songs

Sorry to hear

LOL, between this and the Paltrow ad, this story gets douchier by the minute.

CEO Andy Byron looking to sue Coldplay

Ah yes, sue them, thus ensuring that the story keeps getting circulated instead of forgotten, very wise move.