Coldplay and The Killers – joined by special guests from U2 and Take That – played a rare joint gig inLondon tonight (February 18).  

With all the acts rushing across from the nearby BRIT Award ceremony to play the intimate charity show in aid of War Child – and also marked the launch of newly re christenedO2 Shepherds Bush Empire – the gig kicked off well after 11pm (GMT) with The Killers taking to the stage first.

However while both groups played curtailed sets in order to beat the curfew, they compensated by recruiting their specials guests for a joint encore together at the end of the show.

Firstly Coldplay played ‘Back For Good’ with Take That‘s Gary Barlow, with Chris Martin declaring the collaboration would cheer him up after not winning at the BRITsearlier. 

“I think everyone agrees that the band to see at the moment is Take That,” he declared. “We’ve just got back from Japan, lost all the BRITs, it’s been a shit day frankly, but it’s going to get better, please welcome Mr Gary Barlow!” 

Then having only rehearsed minutes beforehand backstage The Killersand Bono joined Coldplay onstage to perform ‘All These Things That I’ve Done’ together, with all three frontmen sharing vocals. 

Earlier Coldplay had performed their own set, kicking off with instrumental ‘Life In Technicolor’ and ‘Violet Hill’, changing the lyrics of the latter to reference Shepherds Bush and The Killers to the crowd’s delight. 

‘In My Place’ then triggered a loud sing-a-long as Martin encouraged the crowd to scream along with him, while later on Martin asked for the lights to be turned on so he could address the crowd.

“Should we play this one or is it a bit commercial?” joked the singer before ‘Yellow’.

With the track receiving a loud sing-a-long, Martin stopped them just before the end to tell them that ‘X-Factor’ judge Louis Walsh was in the audience.

“You’re our favourite judge so I’m sure we’ll all do a good version of‘Yellow’,” he confidently declared.

The band then wrapped up their set up with ‘Fix You and ‘Viva La Vida’in advance of their collaborative climax. 

Coldplay played:

‘Life In Technicolor’
‘Violet Hill’
‘Clocks’
‘In My Place’
’42’
‘Yellow’
‘Lost’
‘Fix You’
‘Viva La Vida’
‘Back For Good’ (with Gary Barlow)
‘All These Things That I’ve Done’ (with The Killers and Bono)

Before them Brandon Flowers and co had kicked the night off performing songs from across their career including the likes of‘Spaceman’, ‘For Reasons Unknown’ and ‘Somebody Told Me’.

The Las Vegas band also paid tribute to their co-headliners Coldplayand the evening’s charity.

“Thank you for having us, we’re so honoured to be part of this, War Child has done so many wonderful things,” Flowers told the crowd. “It’s great to be partnered with Coldplay. I remember when I first saw the video for ‘Yellow’ they were a real inspiration it made me think we had a real chance, so we’re honoured to be here with them.”

The Killers played:

‘Spaceman’
‘Somebody Told Me’
‘This Is Your Life’
‘Human’
‘For Reasons Unknown’
‘Read My Mind’
‘Mr Brightside’
‘When You Were Young’