Viva La Vida - Prospekt's March Edition
Studio Album by Coldplay released in 2008Viva La Vida - Prospekt's March Edition review
The album with the continuation
The musicians of the band Coldplay are known for a long time for their hesitation towards their creativity, although bid armies of fans in their native Great Britain and on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean acknowledge the huge gift of the artist unanimously. However, if one ponders over this question, the person would conclude that the performer, who constantly labors over the albums and strived to make them perfect, is worth more admiration than the one, who provides the listeners with the beforehand ill quality or raw material. In this matter, the band Coldplay can be called irreproachable - each of their albums was both well thought and well recorded in a studio, but with every their long-play the public and the critics could notice the undoubted growth of the Coldplay members in the musical field. Their last creation Viva la Vida became the most professional and musically multi-layered full-length by the band, produced by Brian Eno, who is commonly credited for his cooperation with U2. However, during the work over the new edition Viva la Vida, the Coldplay members decided not to put some tracks on the disc - the reason was the aforementioned strive for perfection. They considered some tracks a bit weak, the others - unfinished. Nevertheless, they found it unfair to hide these songs from the listeners, and released the enlarged variant of the album, calling it Viva la Vida: Prospekt's March.
The songs worth their place on the disc
Thus, on the new edition of Viva la Vida, the Coldplay musicians propose to the listeners eight tracks all in all, two of them being remixes. But the most interesting thing is in the fact, that the earlier unheard songs by the artists that are present on the new version of the disc, are no ways worse than the ones from the basic release - they can be even called interchangeable. The first part of the disc has the slightly changed material from Viva La Vida, although in some cases the difference is not noticed. However, after the epic track Death And All His Friends, we can hear the second part of the long-play opener - Life In Technicolo, Pt. 2. This is an instrumental composition with the life-affirming and heavenly romantic chorus. The brief, but extremely deep keyboard tune Postcards From Far Away lasts less than a minute. On the rock track Glass Of Water, an ideal stadium-ready song, one can easily feel the touch of Brian Eno and his U2 time. The experimental composition Rainy Day with the danceable beat and elements of funk can be called one of the bravest album’s numbers. The organ-layered ballad Prospekt's March/Poppyfields became a genuinely philosophic revelation by Chris Martin about his morality and its difference from the moral point of view of those, whom he loves. The track Lost got an unexpected reading on the remix Lost (Jay-Z Remix), which sparkles with the cameo by rapper Jay-Z, who is a friend of Chris Martin. The following Lovers In Japan (Osaka Sun Mix) also gave new shades to the famous single. The disc closes with the dreamy composition Now My Feet Won't Touch The Ground, which leaves the feeling of unfinished and something hidden and mystical.
Coldplay: the romantics of today’s world
It is very fair from Coldplay’s party to include the songs from the studio sessions of Viva La Vida into the special edition of the disc, as they could postpone them, for example, until the next release. The thing is that such alt-rock bands as this one, are constantly developing and moving higher on the musical ladder, and the old songs on the new stage of their development could seem not as the week material, but as a step backwards. Luckily, the musicians surpassed the trial by sincerity, first before themselves. Thus, the disc Viva la Vida: Prospekt's March became an improvised opportunity for the listeners to draw the curtain over the Coldplay’s mystery - they will hear the tracks that did not get on the final disc, they will deeper feel the moods that were in the studio during the working sessions. As in the case with the previous issue, the cover of Viva la Vida: Prospekt's March is decorated with the masterpiece by French painter Eugene Delacroix, but this time it is the battle scene Battle of Poitiers. Moreover, the songs that are included in this work, are also devoted to such eternal things as love, life, death, was and peace. The members of Coldplay are called the romantics of the nowadays rock scene due to certain reasons - the musicians keenly catch all the most concerning world messages and put them into their songs. That is why the disc Viva la Vida: Prospekt's March can be called the clue for the complicated, multi-layered album Viva La Vida - only if you listen to the new eight tracks, you would get deeper into the emotional jungles of Coldplay.