COLDPLAY live concert review: Blew away my low expectations!

I have to admit, when I first bought tickets ($480 HK, cheapest seats: we bought them the moment tickets opened) I didn't have very high expectations. I like Coldplay, but I've never been a die-hard fan, and their songs can tend to fade into each other when you have a whole album playing at once. It's a good sound, but not one of my top favorite bands or anything. So I was expecting to have a good time at my last concert in HK with my friends, but not neccessarily anything blow-my-brains-out phenomenal.

Well, forget that. Even without my low expectations, the concert was blow-my-brains-out phenomenal. Coldplay live is a huge, huge, HUGE improvement on Coldplay CD'd.

Chris Martin has so much energy, I swear he must have been high. He literally flails around the stage the entire time: jumping, twirling, SKIPPING, dancing, bouncing...he is 100% invested in his music to the point where he puts his ENTIRE self into it. He's so genuine it is captivating to watch. (It also doesn't hurt that he is incredibly attractive, and the close-up screens were shot in very high resolution.) When he sings you believe it: it is heartbreaking and uplifting, sung with every ounce of spirit in his body. His banter is very goofy: you can tell he doesn't take himself too seriously (giving off a bit of a Jason Mraz vibe with less awkward, actually) and that he loves what he does and where he is.

Set highlight: a solo moment where he accompanied himself on the piano sans band, singing "The Hardest Part"....I liked the piano version so much better than the instrumental-loaded version from their CD. It was pure and tender in all the right places with just enough soul to make it soar rather than turn into an emo dirge. He screwed up his piano playing a bit near the end, took a break to say "Sorry, I f***ed that one up good", and then went back into it, smiling: very graceful, very real, very nice. The whole point of a concert is to see a real person...which is also why I didn't like the visual effects and fancy cuts the hi-res screens kept using. I don't come to concerts to feel like I'm watching a music video: I want to see real people, I want to hear real tuning, I want to see mistakes, I want to be able to imagine these people as something other than CD covers and youtube clips!

Then he did something nice: the whole band moved to the very back of the stadium and stood in the center of the cheap ticket stands to perform a couple of lo-tech acoustic songs, including a cover of "I'm A Believer" in which he had us do a "Coldplay cell phone Mexican wave", and a song where he let his drummer take over in a solo. My friends Olivia, Charles & I pushed through and stood on some hapless person's seats, making us less than 30 feet away from Chris Martin. Charles, being Charles, yelled out "I LOVE YOU CHRIS!", and Chris Martin pointed at him, smiled, and mouthed "I love you too!". (When I retell that story in the future I am going to replace Charles' name with mine. Just saying.) All in all, a very sweet moment that further illustrates their committment to their fans.

As for the final act, I'll just quote a fan: "I never knew that that amount of sweat could be so sexy!!"

More than made up for the fact that it took the crowd of ELEVEN THOUSAND PEOPLE over 40 minutes to leave the stadium. This concert really made me feel alive. If you ever get the chance to see Coldplay live, take it; even if you're just a minor fan. It really is worth the admissions ticket and is so much more animated than their occasionally one-note records. Definite plus.