Viva La Vida means "Just Okay"

It actually means Live the Life (or long live life) and it refers to Coldplay's newest CD. Am I a music critic, no, but I thought I would add my two cents about their newest album just because that is what a blog is for. So after 1 week of listening, I think I am finally ready to talk about it. I am a huge Coldplay fan (yes me and the millions of 17 year old girls all around the world), actually Chris Martin's enthusiasm while on stage is actually something that I really enjoy watching (note that this is hard to do while listening to a CD).

Anyway, onto what I thought about the CD. As I said in the title, it was just okay. There are people that really slammed this album as being terrible, note that it is slightly different from their previous CD's, but it is not terrible. The music is actually pretty good, but the one thing that knocks it down are some of the weak lyrics weaved throughout the songs. It appeared that on almost every song, the band was trying to experiment, so, besides the theme of life and death, there is really not too much fluency that connects the songs together. It seems like a mish mosh of different songs thrown together to make an album. I was really worried about the album when I heard the first two singles (Violet Hill and Viva La Vida - by the way is anyone else as confused as to why this is a hit song?). But the rest of the album is better then those two singles, although I am not sure many of the songs will translate into radio hits like tracks from previous albums. I would like to see Coldplay build on some of the things they present in this album for future albums, but I hope they can see some of the faults in this one to move forward.

Overall I give the album 2.5 out of 5 gerken pickles. (note that Coldplay's 2nd album "A Rush of Blood to the Head" would have received 4.5 out of 5, Parachutes would have received 4 out of 5, and X&Y would have received 3.5 out of 5).

Best...so far

The Editor's new CD "An End Has a Start" was released today, and there is no question that this is the best album of 2007 so far (you may ask how I know since it was just released, well I have been listening to the album for the past couple of weeks on their myspace page, so yes, I know).

Yes the lead singer sounds like Interpol's lead singer, I haven't heard much of Interpol's new album, but from what I hear the only comparison is in the sound of the voice of the each band's lead singer, other then that there is really no comparisons. I hate comparing bands to other bands, but to give you an idea as to the music I like, the lead for best CD so far this year was Bloc Party. Note that I am in China and I am not one that is going to spend $300USD's a year buying music so there are certainly other albums out there that I'm sure are great (The Arcade Fire? LCD Soundsystem? Spoon?), but based on what I have heard and bought these two take the cake so far.

Call Me Giddy

Sometimes I get like a 14 year old schoolgirl when it comes to the music I listen to. You know what that's like (we all did it with N'Sync's "Bye Bye Bye", come on admit it), when you listen to a song over and over and over and over again, until after the first day of listening to it you know all the words. So I haven't memorized the words yet, but I can't stop listening to the first two singles that were released by the Editors from their upcoming album "An End Has A Start." The songs "Smokers outside the hospital doors" and the title track "An end has a start" are two amazing songs. I know that this does not mean that the whole album is going to be great, but I can't wait for the album to drop (I love using pop culture terms in my blog) on July 17, probably my second most anticipated album of the year after Bloc Party (and that one did not disappoint).

On other music listening notes, the first single from the new Pela album, "Lost to the Lonesome" is another awesome song that I can't stop listening to. Oh man that Father's Day present (I already know what it is) will help this album to be another great digital addition to my collection.

For those of you who are not aware of this (probably my over 65 readers only), if you want to listen to more then just a 30 second clip of the songs mentioned above, go to the artist's myspace page (links provided) and you can listen (and get hooked) to the songs for free. Now, where's my Webkinz, I have to digitally feed him.