Review Summary: Consistent, cohesive, and with just enough variety to keep listeners engaged throughout its runtime, Coldplay’s sophomore album is nothing short of a masterpiece.
After the overwhelming success of 2000’s
Parachutes, Coldplay had a bit of a creative crisis and it’s not at all surprising that that would be the case. After all, the band members were relatively young at the time of the album’s release, and while it was remarkably good and very deserving of the acclaim it received it evidently wasn’t an album released with the intention of appealing to such a wide audience. On
Parachutes, Coldplay didn’t sound like a band that was reaching for the stars; rather, they sounded like four talented and inspired musicians making a bunch of great songs, some of which worked cohesively within the album’s overall atmosphere and some of which didn’t. But upon receiving the response that their debut garnered, the band had a sudden realization that they were hitting the big time and that they needed to follow up that album with something even greater in order to maintain relevance. Coldplay had a brief period of writer’s block before overcoming their collective self-doubt and composing “In My Place”, which, naturally, became the first single released from the album and remains one of the band’s most beloved songs. It served as a reminder to the band that they still had lots of great ideas left in them and that their second album very well could build upon the monumental success of their debut; with this inspiration fresh in their minds, the band got right to work and ended up producing the greatest album of their career.
Undeniably, “In My Place” is quite deserving of the important role it’s had in Coldplay’s history. With a charming and simple guitar hook, a memorable vocal melody and a certain confidence that was lacking in much of
Parachutes, the song’s success was no accident. In fact, all four of
A Rush of Blood to the Head’s singles, lined up rather quaintly after the poignant 9/11-inspired opener “Politik”, have memorable, inspired vocal melodies and instrumental hooks, not to mention intelligent song structures and thought-provoking lyrics. There’s variety present among the singles as well: “In My Place” is a carefree, nostalgic piece with effective use of organ that contrasts the serious tone of “Politik” quite nicely; “God Put a Smile upon Your Face” is a harder-rocking track, the lyrics of which question the role of religion in modern-day society; “The Scientist” is a poignant piano ballad about a painful break-up, with a stunning build-up towards the end that makes excellent use of Chris Martin’s distinctive falsetto; “Clocks” is a haunting, unique piano-driven song whose unusual, ambiguous lyrics have no apparent or direct meaning. All four songs are among Coldplay’s best, and they’ve all been staples of the band’s live performances ever since their release; it’s not hard to see why.
The meticulous composition and precise execution of
A Rush of Blood to the Head’s singles are present throughout the album’s 54-minute runtime. The singles, in fact, don’t even seem like standout tracks given the consistency and memorability of the rest of the disc; songs like “Politik”, “Warning Sign”, the title track and “Amsterdam” are all fantastic songs that very well could have also been singles, and they all establish a clean, balanced and vocally-driven alternative rock sound that differs greatly from the very band-oriented compositions that dominated
Parachutes. On the other hand, “God Put a Smile upon Your Face”, “Clocks”, the more up-tempo, somewhat Spanish-influenced “Daylight”, and the heavy, repetitive, atmospheric “A Whisper” are all successful departures from that sound, the only possible blemish being the cutesy, swinging, and not-necessarily-bad-but-somewhat-pointless ballad “Green Eyes”. While it’s perfectly plausible that the similarities between the lower-tempo songs would result in the overall album being monotonous, this is hardly the case here, as there are enough breaks in the mould to keep the listener’s interest for all 54 minutes. “Politik”, “Warning Sign”, and “Amsterdam” all end with a stunning change in colour: “So give me love over this”; “As I fall back into your open arms”; “You came along and you cut me loose”. Meanwhile, the title track maintains its precise pacing while experimenting with several different sounds and colours to maintain its intrigue.
As a matter of fact, the album’s title track may very well be the absolute finest moment of Coldplay’s entire career. Written as an homage to the legendary American singer-songwriter Johnny Cash, its lyrics are easily the most profoundly moving that Chris Martin has ever penned, and despite being a very dynamic full-band composition, it manages to perfectly capture the one-man-with-a-guitar feeling that Cash maintained in all of his songs. The song is a breathtaking achievement, a monumental high in the band’s career that they will likely never dare to attempt again; it is a moment of catharsis that can only sensibly lend itself to the hopeful, resolute finale that is “Amsterdam”, and when it does, you realize that the album really has felt like a journey; Coldplay’s songwriting has never since felt quite so masterful as it does on these last two tracks, and it likely never will.
The pressure that the members of Coldplay put on themselves and on each other to improve as a band and to challenge the comfort zone established by their debut caused a great deal of tension within the band during this album’s recording sessions, even sometimes causing members to threaten to quit and to abruptly end the session. But despite the challenges that the band may have faced throughout
A Rush of Blood to the Head’s conception, it’s evident in the final result that their ambition did nothing but good for their career. While they may never again push towards perfection quite in the way they did while recording this album, it was evidently the right thing for them to do at the time, and the outcome was a collection of songs that arguably remains more important and universally respected than any other release put out in their 18 years as a band. Regardless of polarized views as to what they’ve become in recent years, the fact remains pure and simple: Coldplay became one of the biggest bands in the world when they released this album, and even if their elevated status may have hindered their creative capacity on its successor, it’s not hard to see why this album has managed to maintain its appeal for over 12 years, and will continue to as the years go on. To put it simply,
A Rush of Blood to the Head is Coldplay’s masterpiece, and judging by the way things have gone for their past 2 albums, it’s unlikely that that’s going to change anytime soon.
