In less than a decade, Coldplay have gone from playing the dark and dirty dive bars of Camden to becoming arguably the biggest band of the decade, proving a hit from Norway to New Zealand.
Delve into the band's murky past as we present the ten top facts that all super-fans should know...
Pectoralz?!
#1: Chris and the Starfish
Long before Coldplay, guitarist Jonny Buckland and Chris Martin first played together as first-year students at University College London. Clearly naïve enthusiasm got the better of them when it came to deciding on a moniker – the duo's first band name was Pectoralz (yes, with a zed) before morphing into Starfish.
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#2: Late bloomer?
Chris Martin once told Rolling Stone: "I had a tricky time with girls until I was, like, 21. I got trapped in the friendship tip many, many times. It was like, 'I need to be a rock star because this is no good: Being the kind of guy that everybody likes but no one wants to have sex with."
Dead cold
#3: Pity for the zombies
Coldplay have become firmly linked to charitable causes, not least Oxfam and the Make Trade Fair campaign. Another little-known cause they supported was Zombie Aid, the charity set up in the wake of a civilisation-threatening virus which turned people into the walking undead... yes, of course it's a spoof; Martin and guitarist Jonny Buckland appeared as themselves backing the charity in the zombie comedy Shaun Of The Dead.
