Viva La Vida

Last night's concert was pretty awesome, I have to say. But I did indeed walk out of there still loving Keane more, and decided to do a side-by-side comparison of the two concerts.

The Bands

Coldplay consists of your standard rock-band line-up: Bass (Guy Berryman), guitar (Johnny Buckland), drums (Will Champion), and leading man/piano/guitar (Chris Martin). They are all British, and range in age from 30-32.

Keane has a less traditional line-up, with--gasp!--no guitar. They are keyboardist Tim Rice-Oxley, drummer Richard Hughes, and lead man (and sometime guitarist) Tom Chaplin. On their most recent tour, they have had a bass player, Jesse Quin, who is apparently considered part of the band now.

Coldplay formed in 1998; Keane in 1995. Keane is often made out to be Coldplay wannabes by critics, because of their piano-based rock-anthem style.

Advantage: None

The Frontmen

Chris Martin, in addition to his music, is famous for his marriage to Gwyneth Paltrow and their two children, Apple and Moses. He plays piano and guitar as well as singing. His stage presence is awesome--he runs, he jumps, he dances, he twitches--all while belting out the lyrics and talking to the crowd.

My one complaint? No breath control. He chops up the lyrical phrases quite a bit. He also changes rythms around, catching little breaths at unlikely places, making it hard for the crowd to sing along with bigger hits like Viva La Vida. It's not a huge complaint, but it's there.

Tom Chaplin, on the other hand, is a former choir student with pipes that knock my socks off. Both men are tenors, but Tom's tenor is trained and perfected. He really can sing and is fearless about sliding into his falsetto. Live and on recordings, he delivers.

He's not quite as hyper-active on stage as Chris Martin, but he does move around a lot and play to the crowd at every opportunity. Both frontmen also interact a lot with their bandmates.

Both men also used the f-word, which made me giggle. I can't remember the context of Martin's f-bomb, but Tom's is classic: "Go ahead and sing along...every single fucking song!"

Advantage: Keane--I'm sorry, but a good singing voice is going to sway me every time.

The Show

Coldplay pulls out all the stops: big yellow beach balls bouncing around the stadium during "Yellow," butterfly-shaped confetting during another song. They left the main stage twice to play in other parts of the ampitheater, to the delight of those of us in the "cheap seats." Everyone got a free CD at the end of the show. They even did an awesome cover of Michael Jackson's Billie Jean:



Keane did not have an elaborate stage set-up, and they were playing a tiny theater in Oakland, not a huge ampitheater. Their lights were pretty elaborate, but other than that, it was pretty much all about the music. Which is, of course, why we're all there.

Advantage: Tie

The Set List

I felt like Coldplay's set list was really short, though they were out there for at least an hour-and-a-half. I guess some of the gimmicks, like running off-stage to play in the middle of the crowd, took some time away.

That said, they played their best songs, and promoted their latest album, Viva La Vida. Their biggest hits, "Yellow," "Clocks," and the song "Viva La Vida" were all there, as well as some whose names escape me.

The crowd sang along to a lot of the songs, especially the big "Whoa" part of "Viva La Vida." That's my favorite of their songs, and I hate to say it, but it was kind of anti-climatic for me. I was more entertained by the drummer, wailing away on a gigantic tom-tom, than I was by Chris himself, who changed little rhythms here and there, and seemed to need an oxygen tank by this point in the show.

Keane packed their best hits from their three albums into a longish performance. Their third album, Perfect Symmetry (which was the album they were touring) is quite a departure from their first two, but I don't remember feeling like the show was disjointed in any way.

The one song I really knew was "Somewhere Only We Know," so when the familiar piano chords started, I was JAZZED. Tom and Co. didn't let me down. This tenor belted the song and invited the crowd to sing the Big Climatic Chorus by picking up his mic stand and shoving it out over our heads.

I have to say it: from a musician's standpoint, both bands are very, very good at what they do. But I think that Keane is more about the actual music, while Coldplay is about putting on a show. And much as I love Coldplay and their music, Tom Chaplin is just a much better singer than Chris Martin.

Advantage: Keane

And the Winner Is...

Well, Keane. But you knew that. I'm totally biased!

But I don't want you to think that I didn't enjoy Coldplay. I really did--it was a lot of fun, and very engaging...but I think a lot of these so-called "music critics" have it wrong when they write that Keane is somehow a lesser version of Coldplay. Because I don't think they are at all.