Coldplay attack 'evil' of profits

Coldplay lead singer Chris Martin today launched an attack on his record label EMI and the company's shareholders.

It came after EMI, the world's third-largest music company, warned that profits would be lower because the band took longer than expected to finish their first studio album in three years.

But as Coldplay prepared for a concert in New York to promote their new album, called X&Y, Martin said: "I don't really care about EMI. I'm not really concerned about that.

"I think shareholders are the great evil of this modern world."

Martin told reporters at Manhattan's Beacon Theatre that the band was uncomfortable that they sell so many albums they can affect a major corporation's stock price.

"It's very strange for us that we spent 18 months in the studio just trying to make songs that make us feel a certain way and then suddenly become part of this corporate machine," Martin said backstage.

He criticised what he called "the slavery that we are all under to shareholders". However, having sold 20 million albums worldwide to date, their album release on 7 June and subsequent two-month tour of America in August and September will play a large role in determining EMI's profits.

Martin said the album was delayed because their first eight months of recording sessions produced songs that lacked the "spark" of such earlier hits as Yellow, Clocks and The Scientist.

The band was formed in 1998 and made a massive impact in the United States in 2002 with the release of A Rush Of Blood To The Head.