So I'm listening to the fairly lame "new rock alternative" station this morning and the announcer says, "When we come back from a break, we'll have the band appearing on Jay Leno tonight." After the commercials, a song begins with a familiar melody on guitar and I figure it must be a cover of something. Then the vocals come in and I realize it must be Coldplay, but I still can't place the song. And then it hits me: "Aha - this is the melody from Kraftwerk's 'Computer Love'. Is it really possible that Coldplay is covering that song?"

But then the lyrics were something else entirely, so it was clear that it wasn't a cover version but instead just a lift of the melody from that song. So my question is twofold: (1) Does anyone know what song I'm talking about? (2) Does Coldplay maybe acknowledge their indebtedness to Kraftwerk in the album credits or something? To my ear, it is so similar that it just has to be intentional.

The song is "Talk," off Coldplay's latest CD, *X & Y*.

I don't know whether Coldplay acknowledges Kraftwerk, either in the liner notes or in the songwriting credits.

From contactmusic.com:

"COLDPLAY frontman CHRIS MARTIN was so desperate to use a riff by German rockers KRAFTWERK - he wrote them a pleading letter in childish German.

The YELLOW singer recently admitted he was hooked on the electronic band's melodies, and that his new single TALK includes a Kraftwerk sample.

But he was only able to obtain the riff by writing to frontman RALF HUTTER and begging him to let Coldplay use it.

He admits, "The only thing I could think of was the pen pal letters I learnt in German lessons at school. I had no idea if they knew who Coldplay were so had to explain myself like a 15 year-old school-boy.

"Dear Ralf, I sing in a band called Coldplay, blah, blah. I drew a little picture. Everyone says it's extraordinary that they said yes.'

17/07/2005 02:34"

Oh man, that inspires me! All I need to do is get a stack of cool records from foreign artists, log onto Babelfish to translate my request letters, and put 'em all together into some new configurations ... stardom, here I come.

Nice catch, Mr. Fab - I knew it had to be more than coincidental. As unimpressed as I am with Coldplay, I have to admit he did a nice job with that melody and the song was quite pleasant (which is about as much as you can ever say about Coldplay, if you ask me).

At least you didn't have to buy the album to find out.

me shudders to think you had to sit through the entire song...................