Florence + The Machine’s Symphony of Lungs is cosmic for BBC Proms 2024

Fifteen years on from its release, Florence Welch – a believer that it is “South London Forever” – finds herself firmly centre-west in the Royal Albert Hall for a one-night special performance of her 2009 debut, and a debut record quite unlike any other. Playing liberally in the mythic and the macabre in its writing and in the percussive and the explosive in its production, Lungs is one of those rare jewels that has captivated both critic affection and a cultish following from its inception right through to the present day.

Like one unruly tapestry, stitched together with an organic ragtag of fabrics and finished with dark-tinged and frayed edges, it is both a wonder to behold in its entirety but also hides new discoveries to be revealed the closer you look. Whilst managing to be both viscerally textural and ferociously interesting, it also forwards some of the most memorable hooks pop music has ever produced. It is truly no wonder that it catapulted Florence + The Machine onto the global stage.

Recognising Lungs as an “unflinchingly dramatic” and “bombshell” of a record, conductor Jules Buckley takes the helm of its reorchestration for the BBC Proms Symphony of Lungs performance. Channeling the flood of sound into new waterways, he finds the perfect match to the unfettered power of the record with duly impressive live instrumentation. Masterfully amping up both moments of the volcanic and the serene that Welch gaily flits between, by the end of the evening he can be credited with commandeering 5,000 sets of lungs left breathless.

Few venues can match the grandeur of Welch's vocals, which fluctuate between honeyed and hurricaning on a knife’s edge. The Royal Albert Hall, however, holds Welch in a coddling womb for her BBC Proms debut, the perfect place for her innately theatrical performance to unfold. After all, who else in the contemporary music scene would be able to look so natural performing in front of a gargantuan organ? Sadly, the imposition of the surroundings somewhat inhibits the audience to truly share in the catharsis towards the start of the evening, with some stilted seat bouncing and stiff upper lips. However, as the set progresses it becomes almost impossible for all to not share in the joy of Welch's euphoric choruses on tracks like “Cosmic Love,” or match her gritty drawl and delightfully peculiar delivery of lines on “I’m Not Calling You A Liar,” or “Girl With One Eye.”

Marching out alongside the fifteen-strong London Contemporary Voices choir to the welcome, relenting beats of “Drumming Song,” Welch moves with trademark whimsy through the setlist, mixing up the record's track list as she floats across the stage. She explains that returning to the album after all of these years she has realised how chaotic of a record it was, and takes this as her chance to “make order of the mess” – a task which offers the most fun I’ve seen her have performing in a long time. She also gives particular polish to the performances of the deluxe edition tracks, which she expresses in retrospect she can’t believe didn’t make the main album at the time. “Hardest of Hearts,” for instance, finds crescendo in a thumping back-and-forth section between the choir and the drums; “Falling,” in a somewhat odd but dramatic choice, closes the night and audible gasps are heard when the lights go out during its final line, “it’s only when I hit the ground it causes all the grief.”

For an album that delivered such a particular hedonistic rush, including odes to throwing up your hands and finding certain liberation like “Dog Days Are Over” and “Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up),” it is funny, then, that the passing of time is clearly front of mind for Welch as she falls back down the rabbit hole into the world of Lungs. “I’ve really had a time relearning these songs,” she laughs with the crowd, “because these ranges are crazy, and you know you’re young and you’re drunk and you think you’ll only sing them one time… and here we are!”

She also includes a direct address to the audience, “For things to get so big so fast on a debut album is both an unknowable blessing and a curse. You never know if the record (or the person) will survive it.” Gesturing to her meteoric rise to fame that is etched within the etymology of the record, it gives extra weight to her description of Lungs as an “exhalation.” Not only does this relate to the deep-seated release central to the album’s sound, but also perhaps represents a sigh of relief that she has maintained her sanity along the way.

Since the release of Lungs Welch has graced us with the head-banging chamber pop of follow-up efforts Ceremonials and How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, the candid serenity of High as Hope, and the folk-funk of her most recent outing Dance Fever, reflecting a pandemic wish to return to live performance. It’s not just sonically that she's been pulled in different directions over the years, but she has also leant her hand to illustration and poetry in 2018 book Useless Magic, printed Florence + The Machine zines (including copies to raise money for efforts in Ukraine), and earlier this summer joined Taylor Swift at Wembley Stadium to perform their collaboration “Florida!!!” in front of a 90,000-strong crowd.

Welch's career has been a whirlwind, and yet she has always stayed affixed to the ground. Still she insists on performing barefoot on the stage, no matter the haughtiness of the venue. Still she remains ever gracious and humble in her giggling, softly-spoken asides to the crowd. Still she sees her performance as creating one shared and divine experience of community. It is a pleasure to see an artist, five albums deep into their career, find new ways to reconnect with their own discography. It is an even greater privilege when that artist hasn’t been eroded by their time in the spotlight, and still remains just as authentic and appreciative as when they first arrived on the scene.

Setlist

Drumming Song
My Boy Builds Coffins
You’ve Got The Love
Bird Song Intro
Bird Song
Swimming
I’m Not Calling You A Liar
Kiss With A Fist
Howl
Girl With One Eye
Hardest of Hearts
Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)
Blinding
Hurricane Drunk
Cosmic Love
Between Two Lungs
Dog Days Are Over
Falling