Any coolness that Coldplay have at all comes from Guy, confirms band manager Phil Harvey.
Hes a cool dude.
Were all very aligned with each other, the four of us, he tells me.
Anna Lee*
What we have is unbelievably special.
Seems like another life.Yeah, I mean, its crazy.
I always think how lucky we are.
When we got into the music industry, it was before streaming.
Now anyone I know who is a musician, they have to have another job.
Now record companies are interested in you turning up with something youve already written, produced, recorded.
And by the way, how many followers do you have on TikTok?
And then maybe well talk.
You might be a really super talented musician but just not very good at social media.
So I guess it kind of works both ways.
Its always about being in the moment, performing to the best of your ability.
And my job is really about micro-timing.
My job is not to be the guy thats bringing the entertainment or adding the color or whatever.
Everything I do has to be like a lockstep.
Ill say, Okay, if I do it this way, it sounds a bit tighter.
Its a very mechanical job I have.
All of that music is really coming from the rhythm section and the bass.
If you think about Motown, its quite an amazing story.
And you knew that history then?Not really, I just felt the music.
I put a cassette in it, and I pressed the button.
I can remember that moment.
Its one of the clearest memories I have, the sound that came out of this thing.
It was Stevie Wonders song, My Cherie Amour, and I was just transfixed by it.
So I always loved that kind of music.
Also, listened to a lot of jazz when I was a teenager as well.
There was a jazz bar in Canterbury, which was the city I grew up in.
I would go there with my friend, Paul, when we were 16.
It was the only place we could get served alcohol without anybody really asking any questions.
We used to sit there and drink Guinness, smoke cigarettes, and listen to jazz trios.
Youre the only member of Coldplay that dropped out of college, right?Yeah.
We formed the band, and I was like, Okay, I think we have something.
I really believed in it.
I mean, it was complete, youthful, dumb naivety.
Karaoke is not your thing?Oh, fuck no.
But were your parents losing their mind?Not really.
And then when the guys finished their courses, we had a record deal on the table.
Hes the songwriter, hes bringing the ideas, the album titles.
But hes really kind of a creative powerhouse.
The songs are credited to all of us.
We want everybody pulling in the same direction with the same amount of strength.
Then band members change, and when band members change, the chemistry goes.
So what we have is unbelievably special, the four of us.
Which is actually amazing.Yeah, its amazing.
You take a bunch of meds and you get up there and its tough, but you do it.
But I got food poisoning and my blood pressure dropped and I couldnt stand up.
I texted Chris and said, Brother, Im really worried.
I dont actually think I can do this.
People have flown in from different countries.
Theyve paid a fortune for tickets on resellers.
So we had to come up with a plan.
The emotion of it really hit me, and I was just crying.
It felt really super emotional.
I think it was the weirdest experience for them.
I know you have a studio that travels with you where you work on new music.
Is working on an album while on tour atypical?Yes and no.
Sometimes you cant quite get the song right.
And thats what you mean by unlock it?Yeah, its like a puzzle.
I assume you just have to give up sometimes.Sometimes you do.
And weve got so many things like that.
Chris has said that Coldplay will only put out two more albums.
Im glad to hear that thats one of the ideas thats percolating for the retirement period.Yeah, I know.
I mean, Chris is such an unstoppable force of nature creatively, so lets see what happens.
Really?I dont know.
Do you feel apprehensive about it?I dont know, really.
And everything that weve done since then is invalid.
I dont think well ever stop touring.
I think its really more about: What is an album?
Who listens to albums?
The whole landscape has really changed.
Its not even about songs now.
Its about 20 seconds of a song on TikTok that somebody sped up to twice the tempo or something.
Theres not many people consuming like that now.
When youre on tour like this, I imagine its like being an athlete.
But I like going to the thrift stores and the vintage stores and finding stuff.
Have you found some stuff in Sydney?Oh my God, I found mountains.
Ive already sent five suitcases full of vintage back to the studio.
In December yall will have a break for a while.
I have an eighteen-year-old daughter, a six-year-old boy, and a three-year-old girl.
The three-year-old is having a phase at the moment of extreme tantrums.
I always thought that was the twos, right?
So thats where were at.
How long do you go without seeing your family?Three weeks max.
Like sleeping in the bunks of the bus?Yeah.
Back then there was no kind of fitness regime.
We didnt have any awareness of the concept of mental health.
And thats how we got through it.
So weve really got that dialed in.
When did you start realizing what the plan should be to keep yourselves healthy?I dont know.
Things got a little out of hand for a while.
Because the first album came out, and it did really well but it was so quiet and acoustic.
We kind of lost ourselves a little bit.
And we lost our manager, Phil.
So we didnt have his really important kind of embrace around us or guidance.
But the songs are like five, six, seven minutes long.
Its just this kind of bombastic nature of them.
I like that album a lot.I like it more now than I think Ive ever done.
I was listening to stuff the other day, thinking, Wow, thats really inventive.
But it could have been three-and-a-half minutes long, not seven.
We have to do this all ourselves.
Its like, Youre Brian Eno.
Youve told us to do this.
Were going to fucking do it.
And it was interesting with him, because he made us do so many experimental things.
A lot of which didnt come to anything.
He still, every week, has an a capella group in his studio.
What does that mean?Well, we would spend weeks in the studio and not really do anything.
Whereas he would come in and say, Right, Ive got this idea.
Were going to play six bars of this chord, three bars of that chord.
Were going to throw in one bar of this chord, and then were going to repeat it.
And every time it repeats, I want you to do something different.
So we would have these kind of mathematical exercises that he would make us do.
Sometimes wed sit there, and wed be going, What the fuck?
Sometimes Chris will bring in something I dont really get, but I trust his judgment.
I know back in the day there was a lot of butting heads over songs and ideas.
Now when a good song arrives, everyone just kind of knows that?Oh, no.
No?Absolutely not.
Sometimes a song is so obvious.
Chris will bring something in, and its just like, Wow, okay.
And it becomes our job to just basically not fuck it up.
Or sometimes its kind of, Okay, theres something here.
What does it need?
How can we unlock the puzzle?
Or sometimes Chris will bring in something which I just dont really get, but I trust his judgment.
I think its become something thats beyond our control now, actually.
When did it start feeling that way?I think this tour.
I was flying over the night that Trump got elected.
Lets talk some about the tours sustainability initiatives.Well, look, some of the technology is more showcasing technology.
Like these floors people jump up and down on, of course its generating energy.
Then theres the rechargeable batteries that power the show.
We have this amazing solar-panel material, which they roll out behind the seats now.
I saw it last night.Its an evolution, right?
Weve never said, Okay, this is it.
And if its good, we will put it in and well kind of keep adding to it.
Does your 18-year-old recognize that her dads a rock star?Oh, for sure.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
She loves music, art.
She loves the shows.
And the little ones are starting to get an idea.
Theyve seen pictures of me on stage.
So theyre starting to get a little bit of an idea that Ive got a slightly unusual job.
Or maybe its just normal to them.
Well, thats what Im saying.
I think it does get normalized.It does.
I just feel like its a country full of normality and common sense.
I really particularly like living there.
I do want to go back to the retirement thing.
You said there was a sense of sort of fear around it.
I think were still years away from any kind of retirement.
But you have to have a plan.
If youre a runner and youre running a marathon, you know you have to run 26 miles.
How did you get to that point?I think its just practice.
I mean, I think we are really in uncharted territory.
It feels like new territory.
