It has been announced that Coldplay‘s ‘Moon Music‘ has become the fastest-selling album by a UK act in 2024 so far.
As confirmed by Official Charts, the band’s 10th album has already shifted more than 160,000 chart units in 72 hours, making it set to earn the biggest week for a British act on the Official Albums Chart since Adele‘s ‘30‘, which debuted at the top spot with 261,000 chart units in 2021.
‘Moon Music’ is on track to become Chris Martin and co’s 10th consecutive Number One album. Taylor Swift currently holds the record for the fastest-selling LP of 2024 so far with her 11th LP ‘The Tortured Poets Department‘ with 270,000 chart units.
In a four-star review of ‘Moon Music’, NME‘s Rhian Daly shared: “Resilience might not be the first word you think of when you think of global stadium-fillers, Glastonbury-history-makers Coldplay, but ‘Moon Music’ is an exercise in it nevertheless. The sequel to 2021’s ‘Music Of The Spheres’ – and one of the band’s final records – gently and subtly distils that spirit of weathering any storm, going on a journey from that bleak opening moment to a more accepting, happier ending.”
Ahead of the release of ‘Moon Music’, Chris Martin spoke to NME exclusively in his only written interview for the album. During the wide-ranging conversation, the singer revealed the topics that had inspired the record and how the band is coming to the end of writing new material.
As for whether the group are still planning on ending their recorded catalogue after 12 albums, he told NME: “The 12 album thing is very real, and it’s a nice feeling. It doesn’t mean we won’t tour or finish some compilation things or outtakes or whatever. It just means that the main story is told. That’s just what feels really right. Just knowing that’s happening supercharges all the work we’re doing now.”
Elsewhere, Martin said the deadline has led to the members having “more hunger” in their creative approach, and determined to make sure they don’t “dilute” anything they put out. He reassured fans that by the time their 12th album is complete, “everything will make sense” in terms of Coldplay’s story.
Check out NME’s exclusive interview with Martin in full here, where he also talked about the likes of Fontaines D.C., IDLES, Chappell Roan, Coldplay’s history-making set at Glastonbury 2024 and the band’s vow to help support grassroots venues across the UK.
You can also listen to Martin’s exclusive playlist to accompany his NME interview.
In other news, the band gave their tracks ‘Moon Music’ and ‘The Karate Kid’ their live debuts at an intimate New York gig last night.
Coldplay also recently released the deluxe edition of ‘Moon Music’, titled ‘Moon Music (Full Moon Edition)’ which features new collaborations with Jon Hopkins and The 1975‘s Matty Healy.