In a bold move, Coldplay today issued a public message on their website, responding to Joe Satriani’s allegations of plagiarism. Here’s what is says:
“With the greatest possible respect to Joe Satriani, we have now unfortunately found it necessary to respond publicly to his allegations. If there are any similarities between our two pieces of music, they are entirely coincidental, and just as surprising to us as to him. Joe Satriani is a great musician, but he did not write or have any influence on the song Viva La Vida. We respectfully ask him to accept our assurances of this and wish him well with all future endeavours. -Coldplay.”
The chorus sounds pretty damned close to be purely a coincidence… I’d be more likely to believe that Chris Martin heard it in an elevator somewhere and supressed it deep into his secondary memory until he began working on the song, completely forgetting that he ever heard it in the first place.
In any event, after discussing the matter with my friend, Johnny Clay of The Dimes, I do admit that we’re only talking about the lone instrumental part of the chorus. Take that away and you still have a truly amazing song, complete with brilliant lyrics and a dynamite performance that not even Joe Satriani can claim credit for. The song, more than less, is original, no doubt about it. But I guess we’ll have to wait and see what the jury thinks.
And the big takeaway of this little lesson is this: Don’t mess with Joe Satriani!
You can read Coldplay’s message on their website by clicking here: www.coldplay.com
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