Mylo Xyloto: Coldplay's 'best album yet'?

The rock group showcases its soaring, arena-ready style in a critically-praised new album — but is it possible to sound too "anthemic"?

Coldplay's "Mylo Xyloto"
(Image credit: Amazon.com)

Three years after the release of Coldplay's smash, Grammy-winning album Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends, the divisive rock group is back with the similarly enigmatically titled Mylo Xyloto. Though it doesn't officially hit stores until Oct. 24, the entire album has leaked online, and critics are flooding the web with early reviews. Much has been written, not all of it positive, about Coldplay's ambitions to make Mylo Xyloto a concept album about "romance in an oppressive environment," but it's definitely winning raves as a collection of new music. Is it Coldplay's "best album yet?"

Yes. It's that good: Coldplay makes "music that is massive and, of course, for the masses," says James Montgomery at MTV. The band is popular because of its willingness "to push the boundaries of what a (very) major-label rock band can and should do." It continues that tradition with Mylo Xyloto, producing tracks like "Paradise" and "Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall" that are "gloriously giddy and appropriately anthemic." Quieter songs like "Up With the Birds" also pack an emotional wallop. Xyloto pulls off the "rather impossible feat of expanding [Coldplay's] repertoire while, at the same time, honing their focus."

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