Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends 2008

"One of the biggest surprises of 2008, because I never liked Coldplay. The band showed songwriting talents I did not think they would have. The sound production is wonderful thanks to eno and the music is generally deep in texture. The end result is a good balance of pop and art rock with mild influences from various other genres. The first two songs are especially solid (the intro sounds like Sigur Ros), the single is of course a classic pop song, and "Death to All His Friends" has a 7/8 climax that is nothing but pure symphonic rock.

Not an excellent album by any means, but I'm surprised that I like a Coldplay Album and that I love both title tracks in it."