“If it wasn’t for that song, that would have been the end of the band”: How one track’s sudden gear-switch led Coldplay into their imperial phase

From the perspective of many outside observers, Coldplay’s progression from radio-friendly darlings of the post-Britpop indie scene to the global, stadium-filling force they became might seem like the fulfilment of a precisely mapped-out strategy.

In reality, Coldplay's journey had been anything but plain sailing.

Creative tensions, and the mounting pressure to keep producing high calibre songs, led to an overwhelming air of unhappiness during the making of the group’s third LP - X&Y - in the mid-2000s.

It took just one song (and one stellar moment in particular) to finally lead the four men out of turbulent waters, and set them back on course towards the light of unprecedented global acclaim

The Song: Coldplay - Fix You
The Magic Moment: 02:36 -The introduction of the searing guitar line and the resulting build into a triumphant crescendo

Coldplay - Fix You (Official Video) - YouTube

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The Origin

In 2004, Coldplay were sitting atop an enviable hill. A mere seven years on from when they’d first formed at University College London, the level of fame and acclaim that they’d achieved was dizzying.

A sublime run of singles - which included the likes of the timeless Yellow, The Scientist and In My Place - coupled the bountiful fruits to be found within their two Grammy award-winning albums, Parachutes and A Rush of Blood to the Head, indicated that the band was in rude creative health.

But, behind closed doors, things were beginning to fracture.

“We were having a very, very difficult time as a band,” Chris Martin recalled to Rolling Stone last year. An array of problems were causing disharmony in the Coldplay universe. Firstly, there was the departure of their creative director (and Martin’s trusted confidante) Phil Harvey, coupled with their label’s fixation with the band’s bearing on their share price. Then, there were Martin’s own personal anxieties around recently becoming a husband and father.

Not to mention, of course, the day-to-day experience of coping with a rapid rise to national fame.

“The only thing that really was a positive was, of course, having my daughter,” Martin reflected to Rolling Stone. “Her mom had been given this keyboard called a Korg Triton by her dad, who had passed away. This keyboard had sounds on it that I’d never heard before."

Despite still prolifically writing for their third album (which would result in many cuts found on X&Y), Martin - and the band’s A&R team - were dissatisfied with the lack of anything as strong as their previous efforts.

"I had sent a whole bunch of demos to our label, and our A&R guy called me back and said, ‘There’s nothing on here that’s good.’ And he was right," remembered Chris.

This criticism merely compounded the sense that Coldplay’s central creative engine room was running out of steam.

Then, from the ashes of Coldplay’s dwindling creative fire, emerged a song that would dictate the band's route out of the gloom, and get them back on the rails.

And perhaps those darkening clouds were a necessary evil.

The song - Fix You - was borne out of a concious attempt to document the overriding sense of despondency in the band.

“That song came from the situation that we were in,” Martin stated to Rolling Stone. ‘It was just everything that felt broken. The band was a mess. We were not sure why we were doing it. We weren’t getting along. This song was the light in a dark period.”

Another major element of the song was an effort to find the words to console his wife, Gwyneth Paltrow, and the grief she was experiencing following the death of her father.

This merger of troubled themes coalesced in the song’s downcast verse lyrics, and its meditative church organ-based construction.

“When you try your best, but you don’t succeed
When you get what you want, but not what you need
When you feel so tired, but you can't sleep
Stuck in reverse"

The song’s chorus tenderly sought to resolve these pressures with a hopeful pledge of support;

“Lights will guide you home, and ignite your bones
And I will try, to fix you”

As the verse locks back into its hymn-like, four chord construction (Eb, Gm, Cm, Bb), gradual instrumental elements are introduced.

Some dotted and emotive piano notes twinkle atop the foundation, and a crisp, strummed acoustic guitar nudges the arrangement onto more stable foundations.

These brighter elements gradually edge the sorrowful organ out of the foreground.

After the second chorus, the song transcends expectations, as guitarist Jonny Buckland deploys an unexpected chiming guitar line. Contrasting all the elements we've heard before.

Ringing like an alarm clock, the line shakes the listener out of the pits of despair, and readies them for a brighter, triumphant second section.

Why It's Brilliant

That urgent, trebly guitar line - an insistent D# note that slides up to a higher A# - cuts through the arrangement like a shard of light.

It’s the musical equivalent of a hand reaching out through the darkness , prefiguring a dynamic shift that musically matches the more hopeful sentiment of the chorus' lyric with musical action.

It's soon backed up by Will Champion’s impactful drums and Guy Berryman’s bass. Martin's vocal delivery becomes more impassioned, as the band finally comes together to land Fix You's resolute message.

It's a dynamic gear-shift that feels earned.

It takes the chorus’s more tender, empathetic sentiment and re-contextualises it as a motivational call to address the verse's myriad issues head-on.

It's, for our money, their most magnificent moment.

Fix You was released as a single on September 5th 2005, and would soon grow into one of Coldplay’s most popular staples. It was particularly effective live - where the end section had the power to repeatedly bring stadiums to tears.

Its expansion into epic size and scope mirrored Coldplay’s growth into the far-reaching force they'd become over the next few years. And, twenty years on. Fix You is still resonating with listeners. As a brief skim through the song's YouTube comments will attest to.

As Martin reflected in an interview with Mojo, Fix You - and particularly that final section - remains an important moment:

“It almost single-handedly got us through a really difficult two years."