In 2023, the British indie rock band Florence + the Machine was touring their newest album, Dance Fever. Everything was going according to plan for lead singer Florence Welch, until she had to undergo emergency surgery due to a miscarriage. In an interview with a British magazine, Welch poignantly remarked that “the closest [she] came to making life was the closest [she] came to death.” That statement, and her experience as a famous female singer undergoing pain onstage, encapsulates the emotion, inspiration and meaning of the band’s newest album, released Oct. 31, titled Everybody Scream. If the story behind the music doesn’t make you want to scream, then the symphony of life and death Florence Welch has created will — but only in the best way.
The first song of Everybody Scream is named after the album, and the screams within are painful and cathartic. The song begins with a background choir singing eerily until their voices rise into a scream. Florence Welch then enters with lyrics containing the confession, “I break down, and get up, and do it all again / Because it’s never enough.” Welch, before the catastrophic miscarriage that inspired the band’s new album, was notorious for giving everything on stage. Her body often became a victim of her own profession, as she had to cancel a tour after breaking her own leg while performing. However, even after breaking down, Welch got up and did it all again with the song “Everybody Scream.” Florence + the Machine’s opening song starts the album strong, with a cathartic and energetic sound that emulates Welch’s stage presence.
However, the album Everybody Scream seems to be about more than simply pain and the release of emotion. As much as Welch explores endings and death, she also ventures into the realm of life and humanity with songs such as “And Love.” One of the most interesting musical choices that Florence + the Machine makes as an indie rock band is to have a harpist. Tom Monger, the band’s harpist, displays his skills in “And Love,” blending Welch’s vocal harmonies with almost magical harp sequences. This, the final song, serves as a hopeful ending, looking forward to peaceful beginnings; this song gives listeners a feeling of release from the pain and fire of previous songs.
For fans that were drawn to Florence + the Machine because of their now-famous song “Dog Days Are Over” (featured in the Marvel movie Guardians of the Galaxy 3), “Sympathy Magic” will reignite the magic listeners may have first felt. Catchy and with a steady dance beat, this song makes you want to hold your “Head high, arms wide” and be alive. This song appears to be the one that celebrates humanity the most, including moments of joy, ache, torment and perseverance. “Sympathy Magic” will probably become the go-to song on this album for most listeners and for good reason, as it invites us all to fully live in the world around us.
Yet, the magic doesn’t stop there. In an interview with NPR, Florence Welch described the power of mythology and mysticism in helping us make sense of the world around us. Welch said she “was looking into the themes of…witchcraft and magic and medicine” as a “need to find … some kind of … power within nature.” Throughout Everybody Scream, conveniently released on the spooky holiday of Halloween, there are nods to magic, witches, the phenomena of fall and using the fantastical to understand reality. No song better embodies this theme than “Witch Dance.” The song itself has a thrumming drum beat that drives the music along, making your heart beat faster and faster as Florence Welch sings of a love affair with Death itself. This song can easily be seen as Welch coping with her own brush with death due to her miscarriage, yet it can also be seen as humanity struggling to come to terms with its own inevitable end. “Witch Dance” is one of the most beautiful and moving songs on Everybody Scream, as it makes us face our own monsters with a sick beat behind us and an understanding of our own mortality.
Whether you are the listener who screams in anger, screams to release your feelings or screams in joy, everybody will find an echo of their own life in Everybody Scream. You can be mesmerized by the stories contained behind the lyrics, or you can be entranced by the hauntingly angelic music; whatever your state, as fall progresses and we are surrounded by leaves turning red, brown and then dead, Florence + the Machine’s newest album should be at the top of your playlist.
Jane Locke is a sophomore in the College of Arts and Sciences. She can be reached at jal562@cornell.edu.
