Armed With a Spray Can Soul

Coldplay's latest album, Mylo Xyloto, was released in October of last year.  Chris Martin, Coldplay's lead singer, says the album is based significantly on the 70's New York graffiti. "I've spent a lot of my life playing it a bit safe or conforming to something, even though I didn't agree with it.  So I have respect and admiration for people who don't," said Martin (Michaels).  The band also made a comic strip to go along with the album, and much of it had to do with painting the town with colors to wake it up, while others try to silence them, as shown in the music video for it (shown below).  I recommend looking up the lyrics, too.  They're all relevant to this post, though it would be overkill for me to analyze the entire song here. This website is pretty accurate.

This song, "Hurts Like Heaven," is the first full song on the album, about the empowerment that comes with the graffiti.  "On a concrete canvas under cover of dark/ On a concrete canvas I'll go making my mark/ Armed with a spray can soul."  Graffiti is a form of expression.  It's a magical feeling, like you're making an impact somehow.  As one of the artists in the movie said, "I did something to make your eyes open up, right?"  It's about the expression.  It's about being seen.

As we've seen in the the books we've been reading, it's easy to place a mask on a person by not looking deep enough into them.  We walk past people all the time, not bothering to go deeper.  Seeing phrases pass by on a train, or even poetic lines scrawled out on desks, it's a whole lot harder to pass it by without some of it sticking.  It's because we identify with it.  We have no one to place a mask of insanity on.  There is no choice but to think about it in the context of yourself.  "When you use your heart as a weapon, then it hurts like heaven."  Pouring something out for all to see, without a face associated, causes more hurt, thought, and impact, than anything else can.

(retrieved from http://www.coldplaying.com/forum/showthread.php?t=88316)



Michaels, Sean. "New Coldplay Album Inspired by Graffiti." The Guardian.
     Guardian News and Media, 26 Nov. 2010. Web. 14 Nov. 2012.
     <http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/26/
     new-coldplay-album-inspired-graffiti>.