Interviewer Gets Cold Shoulder

Coldplay frontman Chris Martin caused a flutter in the media by walking out of a BBC radio arts programme June 13 because he wasn’t happy with the interviewer’s questions.

"I wouldn’t agree with you there at all, no. I’d say you’re journalistically twisting me into saying something I don’t really mean," he replied when Radio 4’s Front Row host John Wilson asked him if new album Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends was a reflection of Martin’s lyrical obsession with death.

Minutes later, 31-year-old Martin said he was "not really enjoying this" and he doesn’t really like "having to talk about things."

He walked out of the interview and left drummer Will Champion to field the rest of Jones’ questions.

Martin did make it back before the interview was wrapped, just in time to answer the final question by mumbling, "Um….yes…yes, yes….exactly…"

Journalists commenting on the matter have struggled to explain Martin’s reasons for storming out over what could be considered a relatively innocuous question, particularly when the new record had performed so well in the week of release.

HMV, Britain’s biggest music retailer, told The Times that it expected to shift 200,000 copies within three days, and forecast sales would be between 300,000 and 400,000 by the end of the week.

The paper said the result shows Guy Hands has "passed his first test running EMI," adding that he’d agreed to give the marketing plan to band manager Dave Holmes to let him decide who to work with.

This approach fits in with "Mr. Hands’ ethos that the artist comes first even if it said little about EMI’s ability to lead the project," according to the Times.

The paper gave Hands credit for the way he handled the situation, given that he bought EMI when it was already in the process of losing Radiohead, which quit the label to initially release In Rainbows solely via the Internet.

On the touring front, Holmes has opted to go with the package put forward by Live Nation international chairman Thomas Johansson and European tours vice president Phil Bowdery, at least as far as mainland Europe is concerned.

The U.K. will remain with the same promoters, which are Metropolis Music and SJM Concerts in England, Dance Factory in Scotland and MCD in Ireland.