Telecaster And the Right Song: Coldplay - Shiver

It was the moment in your tiny, furniture-cramped bedroom in Surrey, I was staring at the John William Waterhouse poster on your wall and you said to me, I have to play you this song. And I remember it was the exact moment I fell in love with a band and fell in love with you, and I didn’t know where one ended and the other began.

It was the moment when Chris Martin still had a shaggy afro of brown curls and the band was straight out of the college dorm room, sounding like The Bends-era Radiohead giving in to every sentimental turn.

It was the moment you were studying to be a child care worker at Douglas and I used to visit you at the campus in New Westminster, feeling small in the atrium drinking coffee, the tall glass looking down the hill to the train yards, me: the poet, the musician, the selfish life, the artist as a young man. It was the moment I never dreamed of having children.

It was the moment Jonny Buckland’s Telecaster was still the centre of the sound, still chimed more than it pronounced, bouncing in the space between vocal melody, note runs moving up and down the scale, his guitar at its best when used as both an accent of colour and emphatic punctuation. It was the moment just before Coldplay were everyone’s band, where they played the Commodore Ballroom on a weeknight and tickets were still available at the door. It was the moment every journalist in the world was certain they would be the next big one hit wonder.  

It was the moment unaware the thrill would end, or that it would be my doing. It was the moment with no irony in the lyric: “Did you want me to change? Well I changed for good. And I want you to know that you’ll always get your way.” It was the moment before you asked for more than I wanted to give.

It was the moment I sat down on your bed, and said, where did this come from? And you said to me, you’re welcome.