Coldplay - Prospekt's March EP

With highly hit successful album `Viva la Vida or Death and all his friends' still on heavy rotation on my iPod. I, along with many other Coldplay fans must have wondered how long they would have to go without new material. Well the answer was within the same year! The album is clearly from the `Viva la Vida' sessions and is also shown through the similar cover art as well as the music. The question is, is it just the leftovers from `Viva la Vida' or have these songs narrowly missed out or just didn't fit.

Well the album can be split into two halves; you have the remixes then you have the new stuff. First of all I'll take you through the remixes. The album kicks off with `Life in Technicolor II' and it is exactly what it says on the tin. What I thought was great about `Life in Technicolor' off `Viva' was that it was an instrumental. Clearly though Martin couldn't keep quiet, making this basically `Life in Technicolor 1 plus vocals. While the instrumental works from the album. This opener works for this EP. It is clear during the `Viva' sessions Martin has changed his vocal style and it fits well with the songs especially laid on top of this track. Meanwhile `Lost +' sees Jay Z rap over the bridge section of the song. It is a small change to the song which works extremely well. Finally `Lovers in Japan (Osaka sun remix) is like playing a game of spot the difference with the original. It must be a really subtle change because it is very difficult to spot any sort of a difference with the original.

Now for the new stuff; you can see from `LIT2', Martin has a tough time staying quiet. So what was the compromise with this EP? That's right a 48 second instrumental, named `Postcards from far away'. When instrumentals are this short they act more as interludes rather than count as a song. It is a nice piano piece but it is far too short. After this comes `Glasses of Water' which in my opinion fit right into `Viva la Vida' and is by far the strongest track on the EP. It is Martin's singing with `Sun' in the chorus which is just fantastic.

The other tracks; `Rainy day', `Prospekt's March' and `Now my feet won't touch the ground' are your lower tempo Coldplay songs. They are good but the standards set through `Viva' were so high it is not quite the same level. In particular `Now my feet won't touch the ground' is an excellent closer to the album.

Overall this is a good solid EP. The remixes are often subtle but on the whole well executed while the new tracks are worth a listen and almost up to the standard of `Viva'. Of course exclude `Glasses of Water' from that list because it is definitely up there with the best of any Coldplay material. On the whole the Ep was more than worthwhile and acts as a bridge between `Viva' and the new album which is set for release late in 2009.