Coldplay dream
I had a hilarious dream last night. I was staying at a friend’s house in the country. A big truck pulled up towing some sort of agricultural machine with big blades. Out got Chris Martin from Coldplay. He had come to tell me he desperately needed me to join his band as keyboard player. I said he was a great keyboard player himself so why did he need me? He said: “you know the way Mick Jagger dances? I want to to do more of that.” (!) I said look, you guys tour like 8 months of the year, and I have a family. Plus I have my own career. “Oh,” he said, “think about it: you’d get a lot more recognition as Coldplay’s keyboard player than as Thomas Dolby solo!” This struck me as a little arrogant…. At that point I was reminded how upset it made me when they borrowed a melody from one of my all-time favourite bands, Kraftwerk. Credit or no credit, it didn’t seem fair to cash in on ‘Computer World’ when the authors are a cult electronic band and Coldplay’s the top rock band on the planet. So I told Chris I wasn’t interested. He was disappointed. As he left, his combine harvester thingy scraped the walls of my friend’s driveway. He leaned out of the window and said “Christ, I’m sorry. Tell your friend the label will pay for it!”
(Disclaimer: I’ve got nothing against Chris Martin and have no reason to believe he would ever be this way in real life! I’m just telling you my dream.)
(pic: www.deviantart.com)
Dear Phos,
Lord, another lucid dreamer. Maybe I’ve been listening to TSI too much of late. I have a tendency toward lucid dreaming myself. In November I began a type of dreaming I never knew was possible, the so-called “merged” or “mutual” dreaming where two or more people are having the same dream. Seems “Dr. Google” was able to find material on it just by my making a brief description in the search field. How I know another person was dreaming the same dream is bit of a long story in itself. As it turns out, all of my lucid dreams wake me up…my “itching, swelling brain” wanting to reach even further into the content more directly.
However, one night this past week I was having a dream and it was one of my “Depeche Mode” dreams, I don’t mean the band, I mean the “Fast Forward” type, everything is running at twice the normal speed, scenes are going by bang, bang, bang…like a Kodak Carousel gone beserk. These dreams wake me up as well. Suddenly, when I was awake from that dream a stream of Thomas Dolby music started in my head. A stanza of this, a refrain of that. Eventually it stopped. Then a couple of nights ago the “Green Submarine” dream. My late wife and I were looking for lodgings. Tired and with few choices, we stopped at a place that really seemed too expensive but we went in anyway. It seemed there were no vacancies in this very exclusive place. I managed to stop one of the very hoidy-toidy bell boys and he politely informed he could find a vacancy for us. The place was curious mix of tech and antique. We were led down a long hall and this is not unusual for my dreams. What seems to make this kind of dream different for me is that I can recall all of the scenes as they go by. Later in the dream I can return to an area by retracing my steps rather than it being a bit of scenery that vaporizes and can never be accessed again.
We got settled in a very Naval looking room for lack of better word. Things were metallic with an institutional enamel green paint on them. My wife settled and I went out to check the place out again. Going back along my former path, I was able to spend more time looking at things. I saw a round portal and looked out. The entire structure was under water. It surfaced as I was standing there and out of the portal I could I was within a small fleet of submarines. End of dream.
I’ve also had many dreams about Roland Orzabal of TFF. Ummm…seemingly less dreams than a sort of contact. Oddly, the content of the dreams often bears out in the future events, even if it may years to come about.
(Disclaimer: I have nothing against Roland Orzabal either. We had a rather interesting meeting a few years ago. This is true story.)
Sounds like the basis for another good song…….
your combine hit my friend’s buick….LOL
*snort*! What a silly, detailed dream! Thanks for sharin’!
I either rarely dream, or else I don’t remember, but I had a silly
dream about you last week sometime, Thomas: you had your own cooking show, and you were grilling this great big
hamburger…!! ["Yuck!" I thought--I'm fruitarian.]
Evidently dreaming about cooking or eating meat denotes
success in business, or future endeavors, or something–here’s
hoping that the world once again comes to realize that
Thomas Dolby is a force to be reckoned with!! Yeah baby!!!
Go get ‘em tiger! Chuff chuff!!
{And ya know, if I didn’t mention Alton Brown, somebody else probably would, hee hee! }
Peace and veggie burgers [yummmmmmm],
Jo (that’s my actual first name–I never liked ‘Kara’ much…)
“Oh,†he said, “think about it: you’d get a lot more recognition as Coldplay’s keyboard player than as Thomas Dolby solo!â€
Is this the professional musician’s version of the anxiety dream? Instead of being naked and unprepared for a test, you’re told you’re better off as Coldplay’s keyboard player? Heh!
I laughed out loud at the “dancing like Mick Jagger” bit. The sleeping mind is an amazing thing!
so glad in a recent thread in the forum that id like to see you collaborate with kraftwerk.saw them play liverpool a good few years ago.i was a bit worse for wear,but an amazing show nevertheless.could be an interesting meeting if you do come across chris martin! cheers,david
Hah!
I remember the first time I heard their take on “Computer Love”. I knew I’d heard the melody before but the context had me all screwed up and I couldn’t place the source. Then later I’d forgotten the melody so my wife sang it for me – this time completely out of the earlier context and it popped right into my head – Kraftwerk! The “Computer World” album was the first one of theirs I’d ever bought back when if first came out. Classic.
I heard a rumor that Kraftwerk did approve & get a royalty for it, but I agree that it’s cheesy to raid other artists for your sources like that. Short samples and covers are one thing, but to grab the entire melody and re-write a song around it seems somehow much more wrong. Almost as bad as remaking a movie and changing the ending.
I have never liked Coldplay; they sound like U2′s rejected B-sides.
Go, Thomas! Kick their arses!
(However, since I am an expert in the field of dream analysis, I caution thee to manage well thy Inner Mr. Paltrow.)
And go, Jo! Rock the Provinces!
I have been a prolific dreamer all my life. the highlights would have to be dreaming within a dream, and composing music while in a dream…..I could hear the music inside my head……mind bogling considering I can’t play an instrument…yet. Best celebrity dream was Richard Burton when I was 12 and obsessed with ‘War of the Worlds’ (circa 1978)…..dreaming must be the mind’s pressure valve.
regards from paul, great barrier reef , oz
I’ll start out by saying that have been a big fan since the 80′s, but have only just discovered you blog. I would never fit in with the arty set who seem to be your main readerships… I guess I never really fit in with any “set” (not that that has crippled me).
The reason I loved your music from the start was because it seemed boldly different, not commercially fashioned to a pulp market. There was randomness, yet patterned beauty, which reflected the complexity and intricacy of nature. Chaos Theory in music!
Your music is unique, yet you have probably felt the pressure to be more pop. You have seen the stardom of colleagues, the rampant, blatant commercialism and rejected it, maybe from a sense of duty or morals.
The combine harvester in your dream would probably represent the giant, clumsy vehicle that these colleagues have driven to succeed… A vehicle that has swept up masses in its pre-determined path. The damaged driveway – maybe every encounter with that kind of machinery would leave some kind of scar.
Disclaimer: I’m actually not a dream analyst; so don’t take my word for it! I just believe that some dreams can be very literal, some very cryptic.
Wow – we’re an arty set? Very amused down here at groundling central, Merujo
As an obsessed fan of exactly 2 bands/musicians in this world, Coldplay and TMDR, (I spent the last year travelling all over the country to see both live)- I was so tickled to see Thomas mention my other ‘favorite’ band. Having spent almost as much time on the Coldplay site as this one and Alloy, I can add that Coldplay not only got approval for their melody snatching but lavished much praise on their beloved Kraftwerk whenever possible in pre-release interviews. They even report their all black attire for the X&Y tour is also a tribute to the unique style of the band. I watched an MTV interview in which Chris asserted that “electronic” music, especially that from the 80′s, is unfortunately overlooked as a a source of some of the most beautiful and powerful melodies around. Guess which artist immediately came to mind when I heard him say that! …..
Ahhh, the joy of repitition. If its good enough for Hot Chip…. Did anyone catch Chris Martin standing in for Zane Lowe on Radio 1 last week?
I’m sure I’ve heard something more hilarious than that, but I can’t seem to remember what it is! I mean I just dream about chromatic blue octopai in my drinking water…
That whole thing sounds like a scene from a sitco……Oh my god Thomas Dolby sitcom! Its genius. Picture this. I write it, you star in it….and produce it… it will be big. I want you to think about this seriously. You will get muuuuuch more recognition as Thomas Dolby sitcom star, than as solo Thomas Dolby! Furthermore I would like to add that you can trust me implicitly as I have never done anything to steer you wrong in the past!
How’s about Thomas Dolby ‘n’ Howard Jones play male roommates, and the Grumpy Old Landlord (played by David Bowie in his Prestige moustache but with Hawaiian shirt from Don Knotts’ estate) only allows Lene Lovich to move in because she pretends to be a lesbian!
Three’s Synthy!
Royalty-cut!
Coldplay who?
oddly enough I had an eddie reader dream some time ago- my wife and I had curried chips with her in a glasgow pub- all without ever leaving Canada- strange thses dreams we’re having
Reminds me of Nirvana’s rip of on Come As You Are (or whatever it was called) of Killing Joke’s Eighties. Very blatant. Fortunately Dave Grohl made up for it by collaborating/playing drums on the recent “Killing Joke” LP. That’s fairly well known but one that doesn’t get mentioned is Beastie Boys rip of Cheap Trick’s Stiff Competition on the song She’s On It.
When my son was about 6 he said another kid had come up to him at the playground and said ‘my dad says your dad stole a song from the Backstreet Boys!’
He was talking about ‘I Want It That Way’ (~1999) which he feels I stole to make ‘I Love You Goodbye’ (~1991).
Apart from the closeness of the lyric, the scan, the identical melody, the inflection/passing notes used by the vocalist, and the fact each song has a 4-line chorus ending up with an expository quote which is also the title of the song, I really don’t see any similarity!
I mean come on, the BB’s song was one of the biggest selling singles of all time, and mine didn’t even chart! It’s like comparing apples and oranges.
Don’t let it get to you. I tend to judge my songs a bit differently from others. I was involved in prog writting for 9 years. 10 minute epic tunes using 11-13 different patches/boards for the soundscaping. Response from the crowd? Not much….
I write one stupid G chord – C Chord Poison rip-off about my girlfried bringing home other women and labeling it ‘Sandwich’ and what happens? The crowd loves it. THAT’S the one they request and want to hear.
Go figure… I think my quote on this would be, “If the general popultaion declares it a number one single then you, as a musician, have obviously done something wrong!”………heh heh heh …….
Peter Gabriel’s Solsbury Hill x More Hair + More Synthesizers = Howard Jones’ New Song. Not a complicated formula, but very effective.
The Strokes’ “Razorblade” = Barry Manilow’s “Mandy” (but this is year-old news to the world’s top musicologists).
Let’s not forget the famous lawsuit from I Want A New Drug (Huey Lewis) vs. Ghostbusters (Ray Parker Jr.). From what I remember Huey won the case. This wasn’t a sampling case, but one of writting. Pay primary attention to the bass lines.
As if the fact that your song came out first really mitigates you Thomas Dolby!! Or should I just call you “Doc” ? hmmm? How’s that flux capacitory eh?
A little “Blinded Me with Science” from the Regis and Kelly show today…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=saAxc2xQG1o
When I heard that Coldplay song I just knew I know it but could’t tell why it’s so familiar. “Computer Love” of course…