The four members of multiplatinum-selling British rock band Coldplay are being sued by former manager Dave Holmes, according to legal documents recently filed in the U.K.
A rep for Coldplay confirms to Variety that the band and Holmes quietly parted ways 12 months ago after working together for 22 years — nearly the group’s entire professional career. They now continue to be managed by the team of Phil Harvey, Mandi Frost and Arlene Moon, who worked with them and Holmes for many years.
The rep declined further comment, although sources tell Variety the lawsuit is a contractual dispute. Further information was not immediately available, as the legal documents had not been made public at the time of this article’s publication.
The band re-upped its deal with Warner Music’s Parlophone (in the U.K.) and Atlantic (U.S.) labels, as well as Wasserman Agency, in 2021, shortly before the release of their most recent studio album, the Max Martin-produced “Music of the Spheres.” The group has sold over 100 million albums worldwide and won 7 Grammy Awards since its debut, “Parachutes,” was released in 2000.
The four members of Coldplay — frontman Chris Martin, guitarist Jonny Buckland, bassist Guy Berryman, drummer Will Champion — met as students at University College of London and officially formed in 1997. Speaking to Variety in 2018 on the release of the Coldplay documentary “Headful of Dreams,” Holmes recalled giving his mother a copy of “Parachutes” in 2000. “I told her, ‘I just started working with this band, and they’re going to be as big as U2,’” he recalled. “I knew it. I just knew.”
Coldplay was originally signed to Parlophone U.K. in 1999 when the label was housed under EMI (Capitol was Coldplay’s former U.S. home). Universal Music Group acquired EMI in 2012 and divested itself of Parlophone as part of a condition imposed by the European Commission requiring that UMG sell off a number of imprints. WMG stepped in to purchase the label and, with that acquisition, Coldplay joined the Atlantic roster, starting with 2014’s “Ghost Stories.”