Very few artists who dedicate themselves to the craft of making music have the opportunity to enter the public consciousness, and even fewer have the chance to stay there as long as Coldplay. At the time of writing, the British rock band has the sixth-most monthly listeners on Spotify of any artist worldwide, ahead of artists such as Drake, Ed Sheeran and Sabrina Carpenter. They are the only band in Spotify’s top ten – Imagine Dragons follow at 24 – and their debut album was released in 2000, making the band older than any other artist on the list.

In other words, Coldplay is the most listened to rock band in the world and has held that title for a long time. Its members are the most prolific example we have in recent memory of what rock stars seem to be – and no one has yet been able to follow in their footsteps.

Coldplay released their 10th studio album, Moon Music, on October 4, but according to the band’s frontman Chris Martin, the band will stop making music in 2025, a quarter century after their career began. Your shoes could then remain empty. Coldplay will leave an interesting legacy – they will be remembered for shaping the sound of their era.

When Coldplay’s debut album “Parachutes” was released in 2000, the band members defined themselves as a different kind of rock star. Both in the gentle way Martin carries himself in the interview room and in the deeply sincere lyrics the band writes, Coldplay comes across as a group of nice, respectable guys who, in their gentleness, have something insightful to say about life. “Yellow,” Coldplay’s breakthrough hit from the album, uses fairly minimal instrumentation, including a simple but pretty electric guitar riff. Jonny Buckland, the band’s guitarist and co-founder, helps give the band their signature spacey and atmospheric sound on the album.

“Look at the stars / Look how they shine for you,” Martin sings. “And everything you do/Yeah, they were all yellow.”

In this track, Martin sings about giving himself over to someone so beautiful and valued that he imagines the stars must shine for her. There’s nothing sardonic, cynical or detached here – just raw sentimentality.

In “A Rush of Blood to the Head,” their second studio album, Coldplay expands their view of the world to include political matters.

“Give me heart and give me soul / Wounds that heal and cracks that mend,” Martin sings in “Politics.” “Tell me your own politics.”

With this track, written as a reflection on 9/11, Martin and his band further define the type of rock stars they are and position themselves as spiritual successors to U2. Not only do they eschew the hard-edged hedonism often associated with rock, but they also espouse messages of hope, healing and action regarding the state of the world. These may sound like ideals, but in true Bono style, Coldplay has reinforced their ideals over the years through, among other things, philanthropy, supporting environmental organizations, disaster relief and helping migrants.

But Coldplay reaches its peak in “Fix You,” one of the singles from its third studio album, “X&Y.”

“Lights will guide you home / and set your bones on fire,” Martin sings. “And I’ll try to fix you.”

The song, written after Gwyneth Paltrow – Martin’s then-wife – lost her father, builds to an emotional crescendo, with the instrumentation picking up speed and slowing down again. In a song that is gentle both lyrically and sonically, Martin finds hope even in the experience of comforting a loved one crushed by grief.

Coldplay’s critics might accuse them of trading in truisms – sentiments too vast and comforting to be worthwhile. I think Coldplay deals best with the moments when we are so overwhelmed with emotion that beauty feels like something we can truly reach out and touch with our own fingers. When we’re young, falling in love and heartbreak feel like their own kind of magic. We can move beyond these feelings and believe that any art that deals with them is not mature enough or sophisticated enough, but we cannot deny the power they once had over us.

In the following albums, Coldplay reaches different highs and lows, with different views on Coldplay’s development. For some, they stay thematically stagnant and fail to break new ground – for others, their sound remains fresh and new. “Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends” continues Coldplay’s political messages, “Ghost Stories” explores the heartache of Martin’s divorce from Paltrow, and “A Head Full of Dreams” leans toward radio-friendly, electronic music-infused pop rock.

For me, however, the definitive transition comes with “Music of the Spheres,” Coldplay’s ninth studio album. The concept album is an extremely safe mix of electropop and rock and is full of vaguely humanistic messages that, to the credit of Coldplay’s critics, don’t actually say much.

“We’re just human,” Martin sings on the track “Humankind.” “But we are capable of kindness / That’s why they call us human.”

Unfortunately, Moon Music, Coldplay’s latest studio album, seems to be largely the same. While the highs are soothingly dreamy and uplifting yet thoughtful, the album often finds itself in a lyrical “peaches and cream” mentality, accompanied by the same sounds we’ve come to expect from them. The title “GOOD FEELiNGS” symbolizes the emotional sphere of the album.

“All the good, good feelings,” Martin sings. “Never let her, never let her / Never let her go (Oh).”

Even though “Moon Music” is nice, inspiring and pleasant, it doesn’t want to be much more. Coldplay has been kind, inspiring and pleasant before, but the band also has the ability to be moving, devastating and emotionally complex. Maybe commercialization has something to do with the plateau, or maybe it’s just difficult to maintain the same self-image and quality as a band for so long. I can’t help but wonder if this is why Coldplay has reached the end of the road by choice.

Even before the release of their last two albums, I thought that Coldplay’s greatest strength was not so much originality as universality. There is a lot of emphasis in music discourse on being “original,” but I don’t know if it’s always necessary to say something original. Going out of your way to do this can result in something stupid and contrived. It’s equally valuable to talk about something universal in a fresh and inspired way – even if it’s not completely new. Coldplay has been so successful for so long because the band has given us all the opportunity to find ourselves in their music.

I’ve listened to Coldplay on many a late-night drive – in those rare moments when perspective is sharpened by experiences found only in the gaps between seasons of life, where both heartbreak and new possibilities exist. This is the Coldplay experience at its finest.

Hats off to you, Coldplay, for almost 25 years of music.

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