Songfacts®:

• This song finds Chris Martin and his lover questioning the existence of the afterlife and, more specifically, heaven and hell. While his lover is sure she's headed for some form of eternal damnation, Martin isn't so convinced:
  
  Where do we go? Nobody knows
  Don't ever say you're on your way down when
  God gave you style and gave you grace
  And put a smile upon your face, oh yeah
• Chris Martin explained on coldplay.com: "That came out of playing live and wanting to have something with a bit more bounce. We were really getting into things like P.J. Harvey and Muse - things with a bit more energy."
• Coldplay bassist Guy Berryman revealed the band initially struggled with this song. It was only after Berryman and Martin sat down and brainstormed ideas that they finally completed it. Berryman explained to Crud Magazine in 2002: "Between the two of us we came up with just this kind of groove, which stays on the same note as opposed to change, it's quite technical but it kind of added a bit of bounce to the song and it made it roll along in a much more fluid way. It was a bit mechanical before and it's just interesting how something small like that can really change the whole vibe of a song. It was just nice because from there on it was one of our favorite tracks and it almost didn't get on the record but it's now one of our favorite tracks."
• Directed by Jamie Thraves and starring Dead Man's Shoes actor Paddy Considine, the video for this song is quite disturbing. A businessman notices that his hands start to slowly disappear. He runs through the city streets in a panic and eventually collapses on the sidewalk alone. As the song ends, the man disappears completely and his clothes fall limp on the ground. >>

  Suggestion credit:
  Adrian - Brookings, SD
• American rapper 50 Cent sampled this song on "God Gave Me Style" from his sophomore album The Massacre in 2005. In 2007, English-American producer Mark Ronson teamed up with The Daptone Horns to do an instrumental version for his Motown-inspired covers album, Version. Ronson later performed this brass version as part of a live medley at the Brit Awards in 2008, with additional vocals coming provided by an up-and-coming Adele.
• This song appears in Season 2, Episode 14 of the J. J. Abrams-created series Alias: "Double Agent." It plays while Jennifer Garner's character, Sydney Bristow, cooks for her lover, Michael Vaughn. Due to licensing issues, the song was later replaced with "To Have" by san.drine on Netflix.
• "God Put a Smile Upon Your Face" is available as a downloadable song on the video game Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock, alongside "Yellow" and "Violet Hill."
• This song features on Coldplay's sophomore studio album, A Rush of Blood to the Head. It was released as the fourth and final single from the album in select regions after "In My Place," "The Scientist," and "Clocks." In the UK and the US, "God Put a Smile Upon Your Face" was only a promotional single. Consequently, it didn't reach higher than #100 in the UK, and it failed to chart in the US.