Coldplay opened BBC Radio 2’s Piano Room sessions performing their No1 hit Viva La Vida as well as their most recent release All My Love.
All Piano Room guests get the chance to perform a cover, and Coldplay chose to do their own version of Sunshine On Leith.
Singer Chris Martin revealed he had never heard the song before – and neither had the band’s Scottish bass player Guy Berryman!
He told host Jo Whiley: “This cover that Guy sent me three days ago – he said ‘listen to this song by The Proclaimers.’ And I’d never heard it before.
“It blew me away. I’d never heard it before.
“Then I watched the Hibernian fans singing it in the terraces and it just gets me so much that song.”
Guy, who comes from Kirkcaldy, then explained how he came to be listening to the track just days before the Radio 2 session.
He explained: “I was listening to it in the bath three days ago and when it got to the second verse I was like kind of like ‘oh, this is a serious song.’
“By the time it got to the chorus I was crying.
“I got to the end of it and I said to myself, if I listen to it again I wonder if it’ll have the same reaction.
“So I did it again and the same thing happened. And by the third listen, I was in the bath howling. It’s just one of those perfectly simple songs and I can’t believe I’d never heard it before.”
Chris Martin then added: “There is a whole other world of music behind that song that I’ve just been discovering, and they’re a wonderful, wonderful band.
“Now we live in the age of coolness doesn’t mean anything, just quality and soul. The Proclaimers make more sense than ever.
“This song is so astonishingly good and we’re going to butcher it right now!”
BBC IPlayer starts at 16.50
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p0khb565/radio-2s-piano-room-piano-room-month-2025-coldplay
Audio
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0027h4h
Session also broadcast on BBC TV on Wednesday 5th February
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0027nzy