See It In A Boy's Eyes

Album: Thank You (2004)
Charted: 5
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Songfacts®:

  • When Coldplay frontman Chris Martin found he had an empty diary for a week, he phoned his label mate Jamelia to see if they fancied a collaboration. They met in the studio and came up with this single.
  • Jamelia sings of a romance where there's a communication issue. She explained to BBC's Newsround it's "about a relationship where someone doesn't speak about having a problem and you can see that they're upset but they're just not talking."
  • Jamelia and Martin recorded the song in late 2003 in London with Massive Attack producer Cameron McVey. Martin contributed background vocals and played the piano. Released on July 12 2004 as a single from the reissue of Thank You, it became Jamelia's third consecutive Top 5 hit in the UK, and third consecutive Top 40 hit in Australia, Belgium, Ireland and Italy.
  • Coldplay's pop/rock audience and Jamelia's R&B fans didn't overlap, so Martin didn't want anyone to know he was behind the single. EMI had other ideas and gave the Coldplay frontman a writing credit.
  • Director Andrew John "W.I.Z." Whiston shot the video in Cuba. It features Jamelia as a soldier in the army who is upset with her boyfriend. "I just wanted it to be different," she said. "'It would have been so predictable if it was just me in a short skirt, my legs out - and I'm not a predictable person. I was trying to be fresh so that people stay interested in me."

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