By Hugo Stelfox.

Coldplay’s latest tour, the Music of the Spheres World Tour, is still going strong after 2 years, 177 shows, 9.3 million people attended and over $1 billion in the box office which has secured it’s title as the highest grossing tour of all time.

After the success of their A Head Full of Dreams Tour in 2016 and 2017, becoming one of the highest-grossing tours of all time back in 2017, Chris Martin decided that the band would not tour until they could ensure that their shows were environmentally friendly, leading to them waiting for 5 years until touring again, even though they had an album release in that time.

This year marks the 25th anniversary of their first EP, meaning that they have been around for quite a while and have released 9 studio albums and 6 live albums, and their 10th album is coming out on October 4th. They have had 24 top 40 hits across these albums, meaning that almost every song that they play at their shows is recognizable by everyone. Their average setlist includes hits like Adventure of a Lifetime, Paradise, Viva la Vida, Yellow, Something Just Like This, and A Sky Full of Stars, just to name a few.

As you enter the shows, there are wristbands with LEDs inside handed out, which light up at different points in the show, making the concert feel more like a party than just a show. They also run a competition between the different countries and locations they visit regarding what percent of wristbands handed out are returned to be reused, which encourages fans to participate in order to get their home country on the leaderboard.

Due to their desire to make touring more environmentally friendly, there have been many new innovations. They worked alongside BMW to develop the first-ever mobile rechargeable show battery, and for every ticket sold, they plant a tree to offset unavoidable emissions. They also get fans involved by having kinetic dance floors at the shows, allowing people to dance on them to create energy, and energy-storing stationary bikes that allow people to cycle on them to create energy.

The length of time from their previous tour to this one could be one of the main factors as to why the tour has lasted almost 3 years. Due to its vast length compared to other artists’ tours, they have been able to actually make it a world tour and have visited 41 different countries across 5 continents, compared to other artists who advertise their tours as world tours and mostly tour different American cities and a few European cities.

Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres tour has set a new precedent and standard for other artists on how to make tours environmentally friendly while being able to visit all corners of the world.