It's hard to live in pop-music limbo. You're no longer an adventurous nobody in a beat-up van, touring dingy nightclubs for attention. And yet after the show, 700 groupies and a limo driver aren't waiting backstage to cart you into luxurious oblivion. So Coldplay, a 2-year-old rock quartet hyped in Britain as the next big Radiohead, continues its life of confidence onstage and paranoia offstage.

"Onstage we just feel really comfortable and really into it. Offstage we tend to just worry a lot," says singer Chris Martin, in a phone interview before a Wolverhampton, England, sound check. "You go from being nobody to not nobody, and suddenly people are talking about your band, and it makes you a bit nervous. Because every next article you read could be the one that calls you rubbish. You're just waiting for things to go right or wrong. You're never really settled."

Though hot English bands usually take a few albums to ferment in the U.S., Coldplay's just-out debut, Parachutes, is a pretty little thing, with guitar-and-piano melodies unfolding slowly underneath Martin's high, lonesome moans. Besides, if you-know-who's far more meandering Kid A can sell 210,000 copies in one week, Coldplay may be peaking at the right time.

Such logic is hardly comforting to Martin, 23, who's so polite on the phone he doesn't even flinch at still more Radiohead comparisons. "The way I see it is that no one's going to be at all interested in it," he says. "It's kind of hard for us to gauge whether anyone's going to buy it. We've never been to America, really."

Martin, who first sang at age 11 in his hometown cathedral, discovered his parents' record collection at an early age -- college added Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder, and the Clash to his repertoire. He and a classmate, North Wales guitarist Jonny Buckland, formed Coldplay while studying ancient history and astronomy. After adding bassist Guy Berryman and drummer Will Champion, they played a few gigs, caught a few breaks, wound up with a single, "Brothers & Sisters," and landed a contract with Parlophone Records.

A few key hype explosions in the New Musical Express and Melody Maker later, and Coldplay has gained enough confidence to monitor its progression on international pop charts. "We're interested in chart positions, because the charts have been ingrained in you when you were a kid," Martin says. "You're interested in how many records you've sold, because who wouldn't be? But it's not the be-all and end-all. If it flops in America, I don't think we'll be too fazed. But if it's a hit, we'll be over the moon."

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