Coldplay at the United Center

Last night my husband and I were lucky enough to have been invited to enjoy the Coldplay concert at the United Center from box seats. If you imagine the stage being set up at the 12 position on a clock, our seats were in between the 4 and the 5 and just above the first raised section of stadium seating. I looked up at the poor souls who were where we were for the previous tour and felt a twang of pity-- three rows from the top of the arena and behind the stage is no place from which to see any concert. I'm glad that those bad memories have now been replaced with last night's experience.

We missed the first opening act, but saw most of Santogold, a reggae-sounding rapper from Brooklyn--she was pretty good. The Powers That Be at the United Center informed everyone that Coldplay would be filming during the show, so they turned off all of the TVs and lights in the boxes and everywhere else. All that did was make you realize how many people had cell phones, PDAs and camera phones, because screens were lit up all over the place for the duration of the concert. Technology: a blessing and a curse.

The other thing I just HAVE to mention before I get into the music itself was this totally crazy woman who was in front of us (in the first normal row of seats below the box) who "danced" non-stop the entire time. Luckily we were high enough that we could still see over her (though it should be mentioned that the rest of the stadium was on its feet for the full 2.5 hours the band played...). But I felt really, really badly for the young guy standing next to her. She was one of those people who had absolutely no rhythm, yet flailed about wildly to every single song, even the slow ones. I mean, she was totally hitting the dude to her left constantly (no one was on her right), and if I were him, I definitely would've resorted to violence. Instead, he kept looking back at us and making faces, as if to ensure we knew she wasn't with him. She appeared to be by herself, didn't have a drink in her hand and didn't move from her seat until the encore, so it's not like she was sucking down alcohol the entire time. All I could figure was that: 1) she just loved the music and wanted to express herself in that unfortunate way, 2) was hopped up on some sort of speed/crack/whatever, or 3) drank a lot before getting in her seat. People like this always seem to sit by me at concerts, I can't figure it out.

OK, so onto the band... Coldplay opened with, appropriately, the first song on Viva La Vida, "Life in Technicolor." I will list the entire set they played in the comments section so as to not ruin it for anyone who's catching them later in the tour... but be forewarned that I am going to comment on a few specific performances...

...Such as the fifth song they played, "Viva La Vida." I thought it was totally bizarre that they chose to place perhaps the most high-energy track in their repertoire in between two slow songs, and really didn't have any special effects going on during it or anything. At the end of last week, Coldplay performed VLV outside in some park in L.A.--broadcast live on The Tonight Show--and they had confetti bursting out of the stage to the beat and whatnot, but there was none of that in the show last night for this same song. I had been positive that they would either open or close with VLV, so I thought its placement at the end of the first third of the concert was not well thought-out.

Their stage set-up was pretty typical, but had two jutting "arms" that went out into both sides of the audience on the floor. Throughout the show there were also anywhere from one to six large orbs suspended from the ceiling, upon which various things were projected--sometimes a live feed from the stage and at other times still images or random videos. At other times they just glowed... guess what color they were during "Yellow"? About half-way through the night a huge screen rose up behind the band which greatly helped everyone be able to see the guys more clearly. While Chris Martin did his trademarked hop-dancing at several times throughout the night, the other guys pretty much just stayed in their spots. I must say that Mr. Paltrow was lookin' mighty fine, too... his hair was not too short and not too poofy. Why, oh, why is he married to her?!?!

By far the coolest part of the night, to me, was when all four band members finished up a song, jumped down from the stage, and then continued running through the stadium (followed by spotlights) and up a flight of steps and out an exit, like they were hightailing it to go get some hot pretzels or something. After they disappeared, everyone was like, "What just happened?" Then a few moments later they re-appeared on a small landing right in the middle of the crowd. If I had been in any of those seats nearby I would've been freaking out. They proceeded to whip out guitars, plug them in and perform "The Scientist" right there. I loved it.

I should also mention that between the show I was at last night and the one held the previous night (also at the United Center), they attempted to film their video for "Lost!". As you may remember from my write-up on the Viva La Vida CD, I liked the "Lost?" version of this song much better, but hey, beggars can't be choosers. They obviously plan to release "Lost!" on the radio as they've been performing it on late-night talk shows and now have filmed the video. Look for me when it comes out! I had on a gray shirt. You'll totally see me.

FINALLY we got some confetti (though it kind of slowly floated down from the ceiling rather than shooting from the stage) during the second-to-last number, "Lovers in Japan," which was accompanied by a hectic montage of images that fit the lyrics on the big screen behind the stage. When it was all said and done, the stage and stadium were blanketed with a rainbow of small colored paper bits. I'm sure the clean-up crew cursed the day Coldplay came onto the scene.

All in all, while I thought their arrangement of the set list was not ideal and some of the lighting effects temporarily blinded many people in the audience, Coldplay did put on a great show and I'm so happy that I got to go and observe them once again from a proper angle. Nothing will beat seeing them at the much more intimate Aragon Ballroom in the summer of 2001 before they became really popular... but now they have four albums to pick and choose from and I sang my heart out along with them for 2.5 hours, which I can't say I was able to do seven years ago.

If you see them on tour this year, I hope you enjoy the show as much as I did, and be sure to let me know if they played any different songs in the main set or in the encore.

- e