Viva la Vida - what's Cold Play up to?

[gerrit]

Recently, the band Cold Play issued an album Viva la Vida (or Death and All of His Friends). Now I have been sympathetic towards Cold Play because of a beautiful song "Fix You".

The release of "Viva la Vida" (and especially the subtitle) is making me have second thoughts. The subtitle doesn't do much for me - why would a band decide to create an album about death and all its friends?

The title of their album does even less for me - I can't help but thinking it is a derivation of Viva la Diva. And I wouldn't like to think that Viva la Diva is on the same level as Viva la Vida.

Does anyone have any information about the background behind the title of this new album by Cold Play (which apparently does well in various parts of the world). I do not like the insinuation that Viva la Diva is a celebration to death and all its friends.

And because of that I feel that someone should challenge Cold Play for mimicking the title of a successful show by two life-loving class performers for an album that appears to glorify "death in all its forms" (a variation on "death and all its friends".) I fail to see a legal reason for Cold Play to adopt the main title Viva la Vida - they could just as well have called it "Death and all its friends" and stick to that.

Is Cold Play trying to cash in on the success of Viva la Diva?

I would resent that. Their Viva la Vida title appears to be a celebration of factors inflicting or involving death. Katherine and Darcey's Viva la Diva have been presenting a show that is full of life and doesn't deserve to be associated with the morbid implications of Viva la Vida. Someone should put in a legal challenge to Cold Play's use of the term "Viva la Vida".

Gerrit

[stevemacdonald]

I don't think they were mocking Katherine Jenkins, because the phrase "viva la vida" was around long before she arrived on planet earth!

Maybe this review in Rolling Stone will put their album into perspective: click HERE!

[Richard]

Do we really have to discuss this on Hayley's forum?

Richard

[Dave]

Hi Richard,

Gerrit also posted this in Katherine's official forum, where I responded to it last night but I won't be duplicating it here. Suffice it to say that I think Gerrit's concerns are unfounded but I won't be taking up the discussion here.

Cheers, Dave

[gerrit]

Jul 17, 2008 22:16:52 GMT stevemacdonald said:

I don't think they were mocking Katherine Jenkins, because the phrase "viva la vida" was around long before she arrived on planet earth!

Maybe this review in Rolling Stone will put their album into perspective: click HERE!

That review does not add in any way to my appreciation of Coldplay. Apparently it acknowledges that Coldplay is ****** *** at least some people (the multiple of '*' refers to unprintable text from the quote supplied by Steve McDonald)..

Exactly.

My concern is and remains that Coldplay are introducing Death as a person

And my concern is and remains that that Coldplay apparently use a title ("Viva la vida") that approximaely means "Living the Life" and then use a subtitle to that "Death and all of HIS friends".

And my concern is and remains that they have seen it fit to use the title of a very close variation of a very successful formula that is VIbrant with LIfe (Viva la Diva) to publicise an album with morbid implications about the friends of death.

I don't care if "Viva la vida" was around a long time before Katherine Jenkins arrived on planet earth. "Viva la vida" by that same argument was around a long time before Coldplay arrived on planet earth.

And therefore the question remains: why is it that within a year of the concept of Viva La Diva being realised, Coldplay thinks it necessary to coin the concept of Viva La Vida?

======

Ohhh and Richard, if you don't want this to be discussed on HAYLEY's forum, why is it then that management here has allowed discussions about other artists?

I myself, Richard, have severe problems with Coldplay issuing an album whose main title is almost identical to the title of a recent Katherine Jenkins tour - a tour that was on long before Coldplay issued the album in the first place.

And I think I am quite justified to put it on the Katherine Jenkins board here.

I am looking for answers on what I consider a quite genuine problem. And it is a problem related to Katherine Jenkins. So I don't see why it should not have a place here.

Gerrit

[roger]

Jul 18, 2008 21:30:08 GMT @gerrit said:

Ohhh and Richard, if you don't want this to be discussed on HAYLEY's forum, why is it then that management here has allowed discussions about other artists?

Hi Gerrit,

This Other Music board was only ever intended to give coverage to artists from the world of classical, crossover, Celtic and light popular music; not to alternative rock groups. In other words, it covers the musical categories that Hayley is likely to perform herself and nothing more. Moreover, our sub-boards (and individual threads in the general area of this board) exist so that members can post important details about those artists such as the release of a new album, tour details, or brief reports of a recent event for example. They are not intended for lengthy discussion about all aspects and side issues of their careers. Such discussion is more likely to attract a response on those artists own forums.

Jul 18, 2008 21:30:08 GMT @gerrit said:

I am looking for answers on what I consider a quite genuine problem.

I'm sure you are but I doubt you will find those answers here because I suspect most fans of Hayley's wouldn't be particularly interested in a group like Cold Play. As your concern is relevant to Katherine Jenkins, I can understand why you would raise the issue on her forum but it has very little relevance on Hayley's. The very limited response here seems to bear that out.

========

With regard to your particular concern, I believe I am right in saying that under International Copyright Law, it is impossible to copyright a title because it is considered too restrictive. I therefore suspect that, although you may find many of Katherine's fans who sypathise with your argument, it would achieve nothing if it ever came to court.

Roger

[gerrit]

Thanks for your feedback, Roger.

Now I know that Coldplay is nothing more than an alternative rock group, I will sleep in peace.

Rock, nor alternative rock, has never done anything to me. Even though I don't understand the difference between rock and alternative rock anyway .

Roger, your comment about the very limited response to this thread on the Katherine subforum means absolutely nothing, as every thread here on the Katherine subforum has very limited response.

It seems that the vast majority of Hayley fans don't bother about discussing matters pertaining to Katherine (or any other artist not being Hayley Westenra).

So why are there subforums to so many other artists here anyway? There seems to be no valid reason for it.

Therefore, as far as I am concerned, right now, throw out this Katherine board altogether. I won't complain.

If you do so, consider throwing out ALL other specific subforums about other artists as well. (How much repsonse is there on those forums? Very limited, if you ask me, except for the All Angels sub-board.)

If we are to take your views to its ultimate conclusion, Roger, shouldn't all "Other artist" boards be discarded with forthwith? Any discussion on Katherine's board attracts virtually no response (this current thread appears to be more successful than most others ...)

So why are there so many Other music subboards here? Can't the other (or let me say - ALL) subboards be compressed into single threads anyway?

Gerrit

[roger]

Hi Gerrit,

Your observation that there is very little response to any discussion in Katherine's sub-board or, indeed, in any other is correct. Because of that, several have been closed in the past. The mean reasons why most of them were created was either because of the significant interest in those artists at the time (for example, during the Pure tour in Katherine's case) or because the artists are with Bedlam (Aled and Nicola), or becasue the singers are members of this forum (Kristyn and Holly).

Another reason why sub-boards were occasionally created was because we discovered several threads for one artist. The only way we could group them together was to create a sub-board.

Jul 22, 2008 2:40:36 GMT @gerrit said:

So why are there so many Other music subboards here? Can't the other (or let me say - ALL) subboards be compressed into single threads anyway?

If only it were possible to merge threads, that may well be an ideal solution. Unfortunately, the software does not enable us to do it at the moment but we are expecting that function to be introduced when Version 5 is launched. At that time, we will look seriously at the possibility.

Roger

[gerrit]

Thank you Roger,

I am pleased wit your considerate reply. In fact, after having posted my previous message, I was wondering if I hadn't been a bit abrupt again (as I know I can be).

Still, how long ago is it since someone last posted on the Aled board (just to name an example)? And really, how active is Nicola's board?

I used to be a member of the official Hayley Westenra forum, but for some vague reasons was unable to log in at some time. After that I decided I couldn't be bothered trying to sign up again. (As I have quite a few other web commitments.) One thing that worked very well though at that forum was to have single threads for other artists ....

To be honest, historically there may be reasons why Holly has a separate board (Hayley inviting her to a special guest performance years ago at Llandudno). With the current state of affairs though, I think a separate board for Holly is completely superfluous.

I have had no relevant information from the Holyoake family now for almost 10 months.

I have tried to restart H-H-I ( Holly-Holyoake-Interational). But because of the total lack of relevant and substantial information, my motivation for restarting her website has virtually dwindled into nothing.

Then again, I am now drifting completely off-topic. But maybe it helps in assisting you to create a picture of my mindset.

Gerrit

[martindn]

I did notice, the other week when we were looking at the Japanese album chart the other week (I relied on Dave's interpretation, I couldn't make head or tail of it myself), that the only other non-Japanese artist that was above Hayley was Coldplay.
I am someone who enjoys (some) rock music, but I have never been able to get into the more depressing kind like Coldplay, Radiohead, The Smiths etc, preferring more uplifting bands like Yes (who are as positive as their name), Zeppelin, and some Pink Floyd (but not The Wall, or even worse, The Final Cut).
Mind you, I used to listen to Leonard Cohen quite a lot at one time!

Life is too short to listen to that kind of stuff in my opinion! But each to their own!

Martin