Watch Florence and the Machine’s Brooding, Melodramatic Short Film
Florence Welch ramps up the melodrama in “Queen of Peace/Long & Lost,” a 10-minute short film paired to two tracks from her recent LP, How Big How Blue How Beautiful. The latest installment of Welch’s “Odyssey” saga, created with director Vincent Haycock, finds the singer exploring weighty themes – loss of innocence, male brutality, familial struggle – against the wind-swept backdrop of Scottish isle Easdale. The video is available to view at NPR.
In “Queen of Peace,” Welch and her younger self roam around the countryside, lamenting at the feet of violent men. “Suddenly I’m overcome, dissolving like the setting sun,” the singer belts on the surging chorus. “Like a boat into oblivion, ’cause you’re driving me away.” In “Long & Lost,” the clip’s brooding counterpart, the Welches drift on a river as a storm threatens the night sky. “Lost in the fog, these hollow hills,” she sings with her trademark flair. “Blood running hot, night chills / Without your love.”
“The end of the video was done in a single take, at the very last seconds of light during a stormy barge ride on a freezing sea,” Haycock says in a statement. “The effort and focus on both the actors and crew was so amazing. Florence delivers one of my favorite moments to date, and it’s one of my proudest technical and narrative accomplishments.”
Haycock previously collaborated with Welch on four videos from her recent LP, helming clips for “How Big How Blue How Beautiful,” “What Kind of Man,” “St. Jude” and “Ship to Wreck.”
Last month, Florence and the Machine were promoted to Friday night headliners at the Glastonbury Festival after a cancellation from Foo Fighters. Welch and company earned wide acclaim for their performance, which they dedicated, in part, to the injured Dave Grohl by performing the Foo’s “Times Like These.”