The band's frontman, Chris Martin, explained to The Sun newspaper that asking her to lend her vocals to the record "took a while to pluck up the courage" but the finished track - named 'Princess of China' - sounds "amazing":

"The album is designed as a whole piece. It has boy and girl lead characters and top of our list for the girl part was Rihanna... but it took a while to pluck up the courage to ask her. We did a show in Las Vegas and I met her and said, 'Do you think there's any chance?' I was very Hugh Grant-like and spluttering about it."

"She has such an amazing voice and it's so different to mine. When the vocal happened I thought 'Wow, you sound different', but I think that's also because she was singing a different song to what we are used to hearing from her and it is written by a bloke from Devon."

Check out Coldplay's new single, 'Paradise', below: