When I first heard of Florence Welch’s voice over an internet radio, Chrissie Hynde popped up in my mind. This South London lass could really belted out a rock song with her soulful voice like The Pretender’s bandleader. Thanks to the heavy rotation on BBC Radio 1 playlist and performances at sold-out summer music festivals, Florence and the Machine found their upstart debut album ‘Lungs’ peaking at number 2 in UK album chart now and had reached Silver status in UK album sales.
The line up for the production is going to make this a Top 10 albums of the year 2009 – Paul “Phones” Epworth of the Bloc Party/Kate Nash/ Friendly Fires fame, Simian Mobile Disco’s James Ford, and former Pulp member and M.I.A. producer Steve Mackey. The first two singles ‘Kiss With A Fist’ and ‘Dogs Days Are Over’ failed to make it to U.K. Top 50, but have gathered enough popularity for their third single ‘Rabbit Heart (Raise it Up) to debut at No.12. Following with her tradition of some finely chosen cover versions, there’s even an excellent rendition of The Source’s ‘You Got the Love’. Her distinctive vocal in most of the tracks was woven neatly to handful of strings instruments and drum machines. Her angst is aptly expressed in several songs’ which are riddled with violence and death.
If there’s one new voice you need to hear this year, it would be her for sure. You can surely see her knocking door on U.S. album chart soon when this album is fully released later this year. 9/10
innitmagazine
