Oceans

Album: Ghost Stories (2014)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • This sad, sparse, acoustic ballad finds Chris Martin pleading to a lost love to meet him again. However as she refuses to respond to his pleas, he concludes that he must learn to carry on alone.
  • The song is a track from Ghost Stories, a concept album about past actions, and the effects they can have on the future and one's capacity for love. The record was inspired to a large part by by the disintegration of lead singer Chris Martin's relationship with then-wife Gwyneth Paltrow. Speaking to BBC Radio 1's Zane Lowe, Martin explained the record's lyrical content. "The idea of Ghost Stories, for me, was 'how do you let the things that happen to you in the past – your ghosts – how do you let them affect your present and your future?' Because there was a time when I was feeling like they were going to drag me down and ruin my life, and the lives of those around me." he said.

    "I was very lucky to meet a very good sufi teacher who started to introduce the idea of 'if you sit with your experiences and the things you've been through, they alchemize,'" Martin continued. "At the time he said that, I didn't really know what that meant, but I trusted that it would work, and the more that I was learning about that, the more music just started flowing through."

Comments: 1

  • David from Far AwayDamn. That is a sad song. :(
see more comments

Editor's Picks

Cheerleaders In Music Videos

Cheerleaders In Music VideosSong Writing

It started with a bouncy MTV classic. Nirvana and MCR made them scary, then Gwen, Avril and Madonna put on the pom poms.

Shaun Morgan of Seether

Shaun Morgan of SeetherSongwriter Interviews

Shaun breaks down the Seether songs, including the one about his brother, the one about Ozzy, and the one that may or may not be about his ex-girlfriend Amy Lee.

Real or Spinal Tap

Real or Spinal TapMusic Quiz

They sang about pink torpedoes and rocking you tonight tonight, but some real lyrics are just as ridiculous. See if you can tell which lyrics are real and which are Spinal Tap in this lyrics quiz.

Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull

Ian Anderson of Jethro TullSongwriter Interviews

The flautist frontman talks about touring with Led Zeppelin, his contribution to "Hotel California", and how he may have done the first MTV Unplugged.

Stan Ridgway

Stan RidgwaySongwriter Interviews

Go beyond the Wall of Voodoo with this cinematic songwriter.

Dar Williams

Dar WilliamsSongwriter Interviews

A popular contemporary folk singer, Williams still remembers the sticky note that changed her life in college.