I've got to say I rather like Coldplay - my first exposure to the band was A Rush Of Blood To The Head about a decade ago - my parents had purchased the album and played it in the car. I found it fairly difficult to listen to as a young child, but when I heard it again a while later I found I really started to get into it. I think they're one of the few mainstream modern bands who have been interested in making good albums, rather than just singles plus filler. I'll run through their studio albums in chronological order:
Parachutes (2000): I only discovered a couple of years ago (I'd never heard Yellow until then, believe or not) but I was almost immediately drawn to the album, which is a very pleasant and mellow listening experience. I would recommend this album to anyone who finds most of Coldplay's music too bombastic, as most of the songs are quite soft and gentle. As much as I enjoy Yellow, it's actually not my favourite here - that honour goes to Don't Panic, which features great vocals and guitar lines which I find very relaxing. Shiver is another great track, as is Trouble, but there's plenty of good album tracks as well, particularly Spies and High Speed. I also love the album cover - I think the orange globe is very warm and inviting.
A Rush Of Blood To The Head (2002): I think this is the best Coldplay album, and one that IMO stands up well compared to most rock albums. There's a good range of songs on here, many of which are harder or more intense than a non-fan might expect (God Put A Smile Upon Your Face or A Whisper, for instance), the band doesn't repeat itself here and there are no duds or filler tracks. Although the album is probably best known for the beautifully atmospheric Clocks, my favourite remains the ballad The Scientist, which I tend to regard as being Coldplay's single finest song. The last two tracks, the title song and Amsterdam, took some time to grow on me, but eventually I realised that these are also excellent songs. I must also mention In My Place - after all these years I still love the chiming guitars here.
X&Y (2005): This seems to be the most widely criticised Coldplay album, and I don't think the band themselves are all that keen - however I think there isn't really a bad track on here, and just about any of the first twelve songs could have been picked as a single. I can understand criticisms about the album being somewhat homogeneous compared to its predecessor, as some of the songs seem to use similar production styles and structures. My favourite here is Talk, which turns the synthesiser melody from Kraftwerk's Computer Love into a soaring guitar riff, although Fix You is another great song. However, I do wish the band had backed away from the synthesisers on a couple of the songs - the production-heavy style works for tracks like Square One or Low but I think A Message would have been better without the electronics - I'd have kept the lead electric guitar but otherwise would have had it acoustic throughout. I have no such reservations about the excellent hidden track, the folk song 'Til Kingdom Come, which I believe was written for Johnny Cash.
Viva La Vida Or Death And All His Friends (2008): I like most of this album, although I'd rather listen to any of the first three albums on balance. I really like both title tracks (and I can't understand why some Coldplay fans don't like Viva La Vida, sure it has pop appeal but it's not a sell out by any means - most conventional pop songs), as well as Lovers In Japan, Violet Hill and Strawberry Swing, but I'm not too keen on Lost! (too hip-hop inspired) and The Escapist, which I find deadly dull. Having said that, it does feature more variety than X&Y, although I find that this is more forced than on Rush Of Blood due to the world music influences, whereas Rush Of Blood has mainly uses the guitars/piano/bass/drums combination.
Mylo Xyloto (2011): I did not like the direction they went for on this one, and Coldplay really didn't do their credibility much good by naming their lead single Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall, or by collaborating with R*****a (still can't quite believe they stooped that low!). Even aside from those lows, I felt the songwriting was worse than usual - Chris Martin has admitted himself he's not Bob Dylan when it comes to writing lyrics, but a song like Up In Flames I think is much worse than any of their older songs as it's far too repetitive. However, I did like Charlie Brown (one of their best guitar riffs) and I very much appreciated Us Against The World, which harks back to their older albums, so even here it's not all bad.
Can't say I'm a fan of their new song personally - to be completely honest it lacks virtually everything I like about the band; the guitars, the melodies etc. I am glad they're not doing another Mylo Xyloto but I'm really not sure this is the way for them to go. I heard Midnight and then immediately after listened to Don't Panic and In My Place - to me it's night and day, not sure how many times I will ever listen to former, have heard the last two many times but will still come back them.