Secure your 3D moon googles and slip on a compostable plant-based LED wristband, let's try and keep up with Chris Martin. Photo: Tom Grut
Review: Secure your 3D moon googles and slip on a compostable plant-based LED wristband, we're all going into Coldplay's cosmic, lovey-dovey rainbow world.
Despite opening night in Auckland being show number 172 on the monstrous Music of Spheres roster, hyped-up frontman Chris Martin shows no sign of running out of steam, excitedly skipping hundreds of metres across stages erected around Eden Park during the two-hour, 22-song set on Wednesday night.
The 47-year-old is full of beans, like a little kid in a candy store, who ate all the good stuff. He's running, dancing, smiling, sweating, toe-tapping his multicoloured hi-top trainers - he appears to be having the time of his life. Most find his loving, nice-guy energy infectious. Some could say it was a little mawkish.
Coldplay take stage for first of three Auckland shows
"We waited 172 shows to feel like we were ready to come and play in New Zealand. I know you have a high standard so we had to practise before we came here," Martin flirts with the capacity crowd, who lap it all up with cheers of delight.
"I can already tell this is one of our favourite shows, I can tell you that, and I don't always say that, I promise."
Chris Martin never stops skipping and smiling at the crowd. Photo: Tom Grut
Do we believe you Martin? I'm not sure, but, but he continues to win over the locals with his playful banter in between bangers like The Scientist and Viva La Vida.
"It's amazing to be a British person in Eden Park and not having the shit kicked out of you by the All Blacks," Martin jokes.
"Thank you for letting us come here and survive."
When tickets to the Music of Spheres NZ shows were added to the global tour back in 2023, over 200,000 people waited in line to get their mitts on them. Demand outstripped supply and promoters were forced to announce a second Eden Park show for Friday, and then a third for Saturday.
Music of the Spheres is now a $1bn tour that has been going for two years. and will keep going until a show at London's Wembley Stadium in September 2025. Almost 10 million tickets have been sold.
It's the most attended tour of all time, bigger even than Taylor Swift's Eras tour.
So even though many of us would have read about what goes on at one of Coldplay's concerts, the overwhelming dance party is still very impressive to be a part of. From the technicolour light show to the giant bouncing balloons. There's numerous confetti guns, at times even flames, and of course the magic of the 3D moon glasses.
The band's green credentials are gold star, the kinetic dancefloor collects all the energy from the general admission groovers and stores it away to power Coldplay's batteries on tour. The Coldplay app will tell you the most environmentally friendly way to get yourself to the gig.
Martin says our Auckland show feels like a "family reunion". Yes, we're a stadium of over 50,000 mostly strangers, but the Brit manages to bring us all together. "We're all aliens somewhere," his T-shirt reads. And I'm on the Coldplay spacecraft to their heart-shaped planet filled with rivers of love and mountains of happiness.
Martin's interactions with people appear to bring him genuine joy, and it's hard not to gush along with him.
He takes the time to read out signs, to wave to fans, to appreciate the lucky ones in boxes and others who've paid for nosebleed seats way up the back. He kindly thanks everyone, from the stage crew, to the bus drivers to the parents picking up their kids later that night.
We meet a couple from Mexico, Michelle and Eduardo, who are welcomed up to sit with Martin as he plays Don't Panic. There's the funny security guard from Germany who slips on an alien mask and carves up some shapes to Something Just Like This. And we listen to our very own New Zealand version of We Pray.
But it's the Sky Full of Stars spectacular that sent me to space. All cellphones away, as requested for just one song, and Martin promises, together, we will take it to the next level. And there I am, waving my wrist in the air as fireworks fill the sky, white paper stars fall on my fingers and tears start falling down my face. What a ride.
There's no escaping Coldplay's rush of feel-good vibes. Photo: Tom Grut
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