10 Reasons Coldplay Should Be More Respected Than They Are

5. If Their Songs Were By Someone Else, You'd Probably Respect Them A Bit More

Why don't Travis attract as much flack as Coldplay? Or the brilliant Elbow? What even happened to Travis (or Starsailor for that matter)? None of them are particularly rock and roll, but are Coldplay the biggest target, by a mile, simply because they're the biggest band, by a mile? There are tracks on 'Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends' that sound like something Arcade Fire would do. A lot of 'A Rush of Blood to the Head' sounds like 'The Bends'. But if Win Butler or Thom Yorke had written the lyric "Those who are dead are not dead, they're just living in my head", it would probably be infinitely more celebrated than it is right now, as a Chris Martin lyric. In a way, Coldplay are at a critical disadvantage to the rest of the world before they even release an album, because even if it's their best work, it still won't be taken as seriously as "proper bands". Surely it's about time music was judged on what's there, and not who released it; it's the same reason that Radiohead have been given three 7/10 album reviews by the NME, along with "We expected a little bit more" conclusions, and it's probably why Blur keep stalling on a new album. Why should great songs be held back by the tags their artists have?