30 Fascinating Facts Every Fan Should Know About Coldplay

Coldplay, a British rock band formed in 1996, consists of members - Chris Martin - lead vocalist and keyboardist, Jonny Buckland - guitarist, Guy Berryman - bassist and Will Champion - drummer. With over 80 million records sold worldwide, the band is one of the world's best-selling music artists. Here are 30 interesting facts about the band:

1. It was Chris Martin and Jonny Buckland who formed the group in the year 1996. Initially, they named the group as “Pectoralz,” which was changed to “Starfish,” the very next year.
2. The first ever recording of the band took place in 1998, for the EP “Safety,” which had only 500 copies released. Out of the 500, only 50 copies were for sales to the public. Nowadays, the same EP, being a rarity, is known to fetch over £2000 on eBay.
3. The band has won a total of 62 awards till date including nine Brit Awards, seven Grammy Awards and five MTV Video Music Awards.
4. Will Champion, who completed the band’s line-up, used to play piano, guitar, bass, and tin whistle as a kid. He learned to play drums, with no previous experience, when he joined the band.
5. They were voted as the fourth-best artist of the 2000s, by the Rolling Stone magazine readers in December 2009.
6. Coldplay’s “Every Teardrop is a Waterfall,” the lead single from their most popular fifth studio album, “Mylo Xyloto,” made its radio debut on BBC Radio 1, where Fearne Cotton got to play it. Cotton fell in love with the track so much that she played it twice in a row.
7. The name “Coldplay,” was reportedly suggested by a local student, Tim Crompton, who was using the same name for his group.
8. The members of the band met only in 1996, during their first week of attending a University College London. It was Martin and Buckland who started the band initially, with the others joining a bit later.
9. “Yellow,” one of the band’s most popular songs, was just fell into place when the band took a break, one night after finishing “Shiver.” The sight of few lights and the stars in the sky was said to be in the inspiration to Martin, as the song’s main melody, consisting of a chord pattern, popped into his head.
10. Initially, Tim Rice-Oxley from the band Keane, was asked by Martin to be the band’s keyboard player, who refused to accept the offer.
11. Coldplay follows a set of rules and operates as a democracy. They decided that any band members who used hard drugs would be immediately fired.
12. It was reported that the band spent more than $4.22 million on giveaway wristbands, during their 2001 Mylo Xyloto tour. The wristbands were tuned to change color in time with the music during their performance.
13. Coldplay is famous for turning down multi-million dollar contracts with Gap, Diet Coke and Gatorade, as the refuse to allow the usage of their songs in advertisements.
14. Their album “A Rush of Blood to the Head,” was listed at #65, by The National Association of Recording Merchandisers and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on their list of “The Definitive 200 Albums of All Time.” The Rolling Stone also listed the album at #466 in their list of the “500 Greatest Albums of All Time.”
15. “Fix You,” the second single from the band’s third studio album, was written by Martin for his then-wife Gwyneth Paltrow, whom he met three weeks after the death of her father, Bruce Paltrow, at a Coldplay Backstage in October 2002. The song “Moses,” from their live album, “Coldplay Live 2003,” was also written about her, by Martin, whom claims the song to be “about falling in love with the most beautiful woman in the world.”
16. In preparation for the video of “The Scientist,” Martin learned the phonetic movements, to create the illusion that he was singing the words backwards correctly.
17. “Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends” is reportedly the most paid-for downloaded album of all time, with over 702,000 downloads. It also became the second top-selling album in the United States, with total sales of over 2,144,000 copies just by the end of 2008.
18. Buckland, in the early stages, worked as a school cleaner and supported the band.
19. In the Sean Penn’s charity event aimed at raising money for the Haiti earthquake victims, Martin reportedly spent £400,000 on a piece of Bansky artwork.
20. “Mylo Xyloto,” which was the UK’s best-selling rock album of 2011, broke an Apple iTunes record for digital downloads sales by selling over 500,000 digital copies within a period of a week. The album shipped around 20,000 copies in its first week and was certified platinum by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI).
21. Initially, they planned to make Mylo Xyloto as the main character in an animated movie, with their music serving as a sountrack. But, the band later realized that it would take too long to release it.
22. Phil Harvey, Creative Director of the band, is often referred to as the fifth member of Coldplay. He was also the former manager of the band.
23. Once in an interview, Buckland admitted that he wanted to be a footballer since he was five years old and that he would give up being the band for a chance to play for his favorite football team. It was only in the age of eleven that he developed interest to be in a band.
24. Gwyneth Paltrow, Martin’s ex-wife, once told Graham Norton that Martin is a disaster in kitchen. She said “He cooked twice and both times the fire brigade came.”
25. During their interview with Ellen Degeneres in her talk show in the year 2011, Martin and Buckland, gave her the head of the elephant suit used in the video for "Paradise."
26. Their album “X&Y,” has been certified eight-times platinum by the British Phonographic Industry. Music Week has also placed the album at #9 in the list of “United Kingdom’s 20 Biggest-Selling Albums of the 21st Century.”
27. Coldplay wanted “Viva la Vida,” to be the first single of their album “Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends.” It is said that “Violet Hill” became the first single purely by accident. The song was released on their official website foe free for one week, and the total number of downloads during that week peaked at 2 millions.
28. During a Coldplay show in the year 2011, Martin paused the show briefly, when a fan played the tambourine in the audience. When asked about he said that the band had tried tambourine while recording and had to scrap it, and that they have been playing for 10 years without it.
29. In the year 2009, the band raised £251,482 for a children’s charity, by auctioning some memorabilia. One of the items that were auctioned was Buckland’s Viva Thinline ‘72 Tele guitar, which was sold for £15,000.
30. The Times Pete Paphides gave three stars out of five for their album “Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends,” upon release and later admitted in December 2008 that he was wrong to have given such a score as the album had in fact become his favorite of the year.
31. Coldplay Net Worth: Coldplay has been listed at #8 by the Forbes on their list of World's Highest Paid Celebrities of 2017, with $88 million. The band's net worth is estimated to be $475 million. As for the members' net worth, Chris Martin's $90 Million, Jonny Buckland's $75 million, Guy Berryman's $75 million, and Will Champion's $75 million.