Live4MusiC

It’s very rare in the ego fest that is rock and roll to hear any artist talk to the detriment of their own music.

In an interview with the NME, however, Coldplay’s Chris Martinhas admitted that he is not up there with the likes of Bob Dylan orBruce Springsteen when it comes to writing lyrics: "I know our lyrics are a bit sh-t, but (the ones for new track Charlie Brown) I like them a lot."

It is perhaps unsurprising that the lyrics to Charlie Brown have led the singer to question his band’s prowess as wordsmiths. One particularly bizarre verse from the track reads as follows.

"My scarecrow dreams
When they smashed my heart into smithereens
I be a bright red rose come bursting the concrete
Be the cartoon heart"

As Gigwise reports, the Coldplay front man has also asserted in the interview that his duet with pop star Rhianna on new albumMylo Xyloto is the highlight of the disc:

"Because we put the whole thing through as a story and there's a boy and a girl part, we thought 'who would we like to play the part of the girl?' Princess Of China was very much a back and forth, a duet.

"Top of our list was Rihanna. Bottom of our list was nobody else. We waited about a year and a half to pluck up the courage to ask her. That's my favourite bit of the album. It's the only bit I can bear to listen to because I'm not on it."

(week starting 16th May)

Rock & Pop

• Danger Mouse & Danielle Luppi - Rome
• Seether - Holding On To Strings Better Left To Pray
• Simon & Garfunkel - Bridge Over Trouble Water (40th Anniversary)
• Bruce Springsteen Promise - Making of
• Billy Joel - Live At Shea Stadium
• Friendly Fires - Pala
• Kate Bush - Directors Cut

OST

• OST - Thor
• OST - Pirates of Carribean: On Stranger Tides
• OST - Sharpays Fabulous Adventures

Classical & Jazz

• Various Liszt: Wild & Crazy

Dance & Soul

• Moby - Destroyed

Asian

• Girls Generation - Mr Taxi
• Tizzy Bac - 告密的心
• Inoran - Teardrop (CD+DVD)
• Xu Zhi An (Andy Hui) - On & On

Bono and co made $109million (£71million) from record sales, touring and royalties, according toBillboard's Top 40 Money Makers list.

The rest of the top five was made up by Bruce Springsteen ($57.6million),Madonna ($47.2million), AC/DC($43.6million) and Britney Spears($38.8million).

Coldplay were the biggest earning UK band, raking in $27.3million, while the late Michael Jacksongrossed $17.3million.

It is the fourth edition of the chart-compiler's annual countdown of the highest earners in music.

The organisation's formula for working out the list is "top secret" but is based around money earned from all methods of selling music, along with publishing and touring.

- NME 

The Ultimate Top 10 of the Decade:

1. Celine Dion, $747.9 million

Dion pulled in $522.2 million in concert-ticket sales for the decade. Adding $225.7 million worth of album sales during those same 10 years, she trumped all comers.

2. Kenny Chesney, $742 million

Close behind Dion was this road warrior, who toured hard and promoted records the old-fashioned way year in and year out. His total includes $455.6 million in concert ticket sales and $286.4 million in album revenue.

3. Dave Matthews Band, $737.4 million

Matthews' decade concert total of $529.1 million put him first on the list of top North American live music attractions of the decade, as calculated by the concert-tracking publication Pollstar. The band posted $208.3 million in album sales.

4. The Beatles, $627.3 million

Although the quartet disbanded 30 years before the decade began, the Beatles still managed to generate $392.3 million from sales of 30.2 million albums (using an average of $13 per album). We folded in the individual box office figures racked up by ex-Beatle Paul McCartney ($221.4 million) and Ringo Starr ($13.6 million), given that their concert audiences consist in large part of Beatles fans. The Fab Four also logged the single best-selling album of the decade, the "1" hits collection, with 11.5 million copies. And counting.

5. U2, $609.7 million

The Irish quartet brought in $391 million at the box office and $218.7 million in album sales.

6. Toby Keith, $591.9 million

The second of three country acts in the Top 10, the Oklahoma singer-songwriter logged $273.8 million on the concert trail, $318.1 million from album sales.

7. Bruce Springsteen, $588.3 million

On the road, both with the E Street Band and his various non-E Street tours, the Boss brought in $444.3 million. His album take: $144 million.

8. The Rolling Stones, $569.6 million

The Stones also benefited heavily from touring, earning $426.9 million at the box office in addition to $142.7 million in album sales.

9. Tim McGraw, $550.7 million

Strictly as a solo act, the country singer-songwriter ranks No. 14 on the list. But he toured several times with his wife, Faith Hill, during the decade. California being a community property state, we are awarding him half the revenue those outings generated. So his total includes $322 million in album sales, $133.7 million from his own tours and $95 million for his half of the McGraw-Hill shows.

10. Britney Spears, $494.3 million

Despite a rocky decade personally and professionally, Spears pulled in $195.7 million at the box office and sold $298.6 million worth of albums for the 10-year period.

The decade's top album seller was Eminem, the rapper who posted $419 million from sales of 32.2 million albums, according to Nielsen SoundScan. But because he toured sporadically, he was able to add only $40.8 million to his Ultimate Top 10 total, which places him at No. 14; he is the sole hip-hop artist in the Top 20.

Looking at 2009 alone, the 14th annual Ultimate Top 10 title goes to U2. During the year, the band posted $137.3 million ($123 million box office, $14.3 million albums), a bit better than last year's winner, Madonna, who finished on top with $120.1 million. Springsteen follows U2 with $102 million ($94.5 million box office, $7.5 million in albums).

The year's biggest album seller finished at No. 3 overall: In the wake of his death, Michael Jackson posted total album sales of just under $100 million, without any revenue from the series of comeback concerts he was scheduled to give in London. (Those dates wouldn't have counted toward the Ultimate Top 10 since Pollstar data come from North American concert tour figures.)

Spears ended the year at No. 4, with $82.5 million in concert ticket sales and $7 million in album revenue. The Elton John/Billy Joel tour tallied $88 million at the box office, with no corresponding revenue from albums that finished among the year's top 200 sellers from the duo, placing the piano men at No. 5. John generated an additional $14.2 million during the year from solo performances.

The remainder of the 2009 Ultimate Top 10 shakes out as follows: No. 6: AC/DC with $83.8 million ($77.9 million in concert tickets, $5.9 million in album sales); No. 7: Taylor Swift with $83.2 million ($25.5 million at the box office, $57.7 million in album sales); No. 8: Chesney at $81 million ($71.1 million in concert, $9.9 million in album sales); No. 9: the Jonas Brothers with $77.9 million ($69.8 million in concert revenue, $8.1 million in album sales), and No. 10: the Dave Matthews Band with $69.8 million ($56.9 million in concert tickets, $12.9 million in album sales).

Los Angeles Times