Yellow by Coldplay

Soul Music

BBC

Music, Music Commentary

4.7 • 831 Ratings

🗓️ 10 January 2026

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

"Look at the stars, look how they shine for you..."

True stories of what Yellow, one of Coldplay's most iconic songs, means to people 25 years on from its release.

It's December 1999 and a relatively unknown band called Coldplay are midway through recording their debut studio album, Parachutes, at Rockfield Studios in Wales. The days are long, often working late into the evening. One night after a recording session, they step outside with their producer Ken, and look up to a sky full of stars. The rest, as they say, is history...

Featuring, in order of appearance: Dylan Bode, musician and coma survivor Ken Nelson, music producer on Coldplay's Parachutes album Debs Wild, fan liaison for Coldplay and author of Life In Technicolor: A Celebration of Coldplay Neil Brand, composer, writer and broadcaster Katherine Ho, singer of the Mandarin version of Yellow for the film Crazy Rich Asians

Producer: Becky Ripley

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	BBC Sounds, Music, Radio Podcasts.
0:05.7	Hello, you're about to listen to a BBC podcast, and I'm Ed Gamble, host of another BBC podcast, The Traitors Uncloaked.
0:12.7	But my show is available only on BBC Sounds, just like Ellis and John's Saturday bonus episodes,
0:18.2	The Pop Top Ten podcast with Scott Mills and Rylan, and comedy specials
0:22.2	from the likes of Harriet Kemsley, Susie Ruffle, and Rommashranganathan.
0:25.9	However, maybe I'm biased, it's really all about The Traitors Uncloaked.
0:30.3	So for a whole bunch of exclusive scoops and podcasts, listen only on BBC Sounds.
0:36.7	All right.
0:39.3	The first chord is a bee.
0:42.1	It's a spicy bee of sorts.
0:44.5	And as soon as you hear that first chord, then you know.
0:50.2	It's yellow.
0:53.2	My name is Dylan Bodie, husband, friend, musician, and big fan of Coldplay.
1:09.2	Yeah, it was eight years old when I first heard Colplay.
1:13.2	It was the release of their Parachutes album.
1:16.5	And I just was shocked.
1:19.8	I just was shocked.
1:21.6	Look at the stars.
1:24.3	Look how they shine for you.
1:29.3	Look how they shine for you. And, you know, obviously we're talking about the stars here.
1:32.3	And it was a very important affirmation to hear.
1:35.3	Yeah, they were all yellow.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.