Songoftheday 2/9/24 - The lights go out and I can't be saved, tides that I tried to swim against...

 

 

"Clocks" - Coldplay

from the album A Rush Of Blood To The Head (2002)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #29 (three weeks)

Weeks in the top-40: 10

 

Today's song comes from the British rock band Coldplay, who came together in the late 1990's in London, shuffling through a myriad of band names before settling with Coldplay after completing the lineup of lead singer/guitarist Chris Martin, lead guitarist Jonny Buckland, bass player Guy Berryman, and drummer Will Champion. The group released their first EP Safety on their own before being distributed by the indie label Fierce Panda. A single from the short set, "Brothers & Sisters", popped on to the British Singles Chart for a week at #92 in 1999. After a successful stint at the Glastonbury music festival, Coldplay was signed to Parlophone Records, where they initially released a second EP, Blue Room, which contained an early version of a song, "Don't Panic", that would appear on their first full-length album Parachutes. 

 

Parachutes was released in the summer of 2000 in their homeland, with the song "Shiver" as the lead single, which landed their first top-40 British hit at #35. But it was their follow-up that would give Coldplay their first international hit. "Yellow" peaked at #48 on Billboard magazine's Hot 100, and rose to #6 on their Alternative Rock airplay chart and #11 on the older-skewing Adult Top-40 list.  A second song from the record, "Trouble", reached #10 on the British singles chart. The Parachutes album, released in November of 2000 in the U.S., stopped at #51 on the Billboard 200 sales tally, but stayed on the list for 78 weeks, going on to sell over two million copies. At the Grammy Awards in 2002, Parachutes won for Best Alternative Album. "Yellow" was also nominated in two categories, losing Best Rock Song to Train's "Drops Of Jupiter" and Best Duo/Group Rock Performance, which went to U2 for "Elevation". 

 

In the summer of 2002, lead singer Chris Martin, guitarist Jonny Buckland, bass player Guy Berryman, and drummer Will Champion returned with their second full-length album on Capitol Records in the States, A Rush Of Blood To The Head.  The lead single, "In My Place", was a mid-tempo reflective number, and it got a warm reception in their homeland, climbing to #2 on the British singles chart. In the U.S., the song went to #22 on the older-skewing Adult Top-40 airplay chart, #17 on the Alternative Rock list, and spent three weeks at #1 on the nascent Adult Album Alternative (or "Triple-A") Rock format. However lack of a commercial single as well as pop radio love Stateside caused it to only "bubble under" Billboard's Hot 100 at #117. But at the Grammy Awards on 2003, the song would win for Best Rock Duo/Group Performance, and the group also took home the Best Alternative Album award for A Rush...

With that momentum, Coldplay released as the second single in America "Clocks". Written by the band, who produced it with Ken Nelson, the song is more poetry than story, painting with broad strokes a picture of haste in deciding things, especially in terms of relationships with others. The title appears fleetingly in the sparse lyrics, but its metaphor for being obsessed with time rings in. The production is a swirling wall of sound in the early U2 template, and the odd time signature complements the sense of organized chaos and that piano riff that starts in the beginning and carries through the record eliminates the need to repeat the title over and over. The music video has the band giving their all on stage...

"Clocks" became Coldplay's first top-40 hit on Billboard's Hot 100 in May of 2003. On the radio, the song peaked at #21 on the Mainstream Top-40 chart, #4 on the Adult Top-40 format, and #9 on the Alternative Rock list. The biggest radio success for the track was at Triple-A Rock stations, where "Clocks" spent fifteen weeks at #1. Remixes of the track, done by Norwegian electronica act Royksopp among others, helped the song land on Billboard's Dance Club Play chart at #31. Internationally, the single reached the top ten in the Netherlands (#2), Croatia (#5), Canada (#7 Sales), and the United Kingdom (#9), and made the top-40 in New Zealand (#13), Ireland (#15), Italy (#24), and Australia (#28). The Rush Of Blood To The Head album, released in August of 2002, came in at #5 on the Billboard 200 sales tally, going on to spend over two years (108 weeks) on the list and sell over four million copies. At the Grammy Awards in 2004, "Clocks" won Record Of The Year, a triumph for an up and coming band. 

In America, the group followed with the song that was their second international single from the album, "The Scientist". That single went to #5 on the Triple-A Rock chart, #18 on the Alternative Rock list, and #34 on the Adult Top-40 format, but missed the Hot 100 altogether. Internationally, the single made the top ten in Austria (#8) and the UK (#10). The haunting music video was nominated for a Grammy in 2004, losing to Johnny Cash's equally haunting cover of Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt". A final single from the record, "God Put A Smile Upon Your Face", peaked at #15 on the Triple-A Rock format in America, reached the top-40 in New Zealand at #35, and slipped on to the British Singles chart at #100.

 

Coldplay will be back to the series.

 

(10/10)

 

(Click below to see the rest of the post)

 

Here's the dance remix from Royksopp that is interesting but totally belies the intent of the original....

 

 

Next up, the band performing on the Jools Holland show in 2002 in the UK...

Here's Coldplay touring behind the album in 2003, which would go on to be a top-40 live album in itself..

The group did a more organic take on "Clocks" at Austin City Limits in 2009....

And lastly, on Letterman in 2011...

Tomorrow I'll have my top tunes of last week, then on Monday Song of the Day will be back with the Material Girl becoming patriotic a second time.