Irish Pub Song Lyrics

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The show opened with a combo of new tunes: the crystalline “MX,” which segued into “Hurts Like Heaven,” a double-time shuffle that fits right into the band’s playbook of revved-up emotional anthems. Reeling the audience right in, they followed with a quick jab, their breakout hit “Yellow,” which sounded every bit as uplifting as it did when it first made them stars more than a decade ago.

After furiously strumming a beat-up acoustic guitar for the first two tunes, a beaming Martin bounded across the stage in his rag-doll dance and encouraged unassuming guitarist and old-school pal Jonny Buckland to step into the spotlight for some spiraling solos during “In My Place.” They slipped another new one into the mix, the strummy, U2-like push-pull rocker “Major Minus,” then countered with more crowd pleasers with the chugging, percussive “Lost!” and a spare arrangement of “The Scientist.”

Martin asked the audience to help bring it home and, of course, they obliged, taking it in for a feather-soft landing right out of the band’s playbook.

With many of the bells and whistles of their previous tour on the shelf — except for some giant balloons and a somewhat modest, for them, multicolored video wall — the band leaned on the yearning majesty of songs like “Shiver,” which lived and died by Buckland’s Edge-like soloing, Martin’s keening falsetto and drummer Will Champion’s whip-crack beats.

“God Put a Smile Upon Your Face” built from a hushed ballad to a chaotic, strobe-lit rocker, with Champion playing a relentless martial beat as Martin literally tossed his acoustic guitar aside in favor of electric to add to the squall of reverb from Buckland.

Martin played the part of saloon crooner during “Everything’s Not Lost,” tickling the ivories as the band built to a slow, powerful crescendo around him, with Champion taking over in his rough tenor while Buckland and Martin engaged in a slow-burn musical guitar face-off.

Martin jokingly introduced another new tune, “Us Against the World,” as a love song about an affair between right-wing TV talking head Bill O’Reilly and Fox News contributor Sarah Palin and his hope that through their love, they might see the world in a different way. He was, of course, kidding and proceeded to play the gentle acoustic ballad about taking on all comers by himself, with Champion joining in on backing vocals and piano, as the song built into a kind of Irish bar ballad.

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