Florence & the Machine | How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful
What is a guilty pleasure? Weekend at Bernie’s? Fedoras? Anal? When it comes to music, it’s something you belt out in your car but would be horrified if anyone saw you. Florence & the Machine was kinda like that for me. Sure, they often got the alternative or indie classification but this was really pop music. Yes, Florence Welch had a HUGE voice, but so did Celine Dion or Mariah Carey (at least she did at one time) and I wouldn’t feel too comfortable with anyone knowing that I was listening to either of them. BUT MAYBE if you are talented enough that can transcend embarrassment? Wait, does this mean I can put Music Box back into rotation with the windows down?
What made Florence & the Machine different was that it doesn’t seem that everyone would call you out for liking them. No on Katy, Miley, or Tay Sway. But FATM checks out okay. If Welch’s impressive vocal chords weren’t enough on their own to differentiate their sound from the more guilty pleasuring voices of pop goddesses, it must be because of the Machine right? Well, that refers to Isabella Summers, her songwriting partner, producer, and keyboard player. When had keyboards ever made music less embarrassing?
Someway, somehow starting about 6 years ago they began to pull it off. Florence and the Machine’s mix of pop, dance, and indie rock won over millions of people with songs like “Dog Days Are Over”. “Rabbit Heart (Raise it Up)”, and “Kiss With a Fist” off their debut Lungs. Later, songs like “Drumming Song” won me over with Welch’s voice blowing my dick off and accompanied by appropriately loud, arena/hip hop style (yes it makes sense) drums. Two years later the band continued their slightly more cool and atmospheric pop music with Ceremonials. “Shake it Out” was everywhere, yelling at mass audience to shake away the devils years early than Swift told them to shake away the haters. In two years, I’m sure Lorde will release a song called “Shake It On” because at that point she will most likely be doing commercials for No Salt anyway.
This month after years out of the spotlight, Florence and the Machine are back with How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful. It’s another number one album of huge sounding pop songs selling over 100,000 copies in the US in the first week. Take that Spotify! And while in 2009 I may have been cautious of others people’s judgment I’m now officially old enough to not give a crap and say that yes this album is a pop album, and yes I really like it. If you enjoyed their first two albums, you’ll probably dig this too. And if you didn’t, stop worrying what others think. And if you’ve ignored the judgmental people and you still don’t like it, well hey, not everyone wants to listen to someone sing so powerful it might explode your black fucking heart within your chest.
How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful is not a huge departure from their previous efforts. Welch is still proudly wearing the influences of female pop music legends (divas is a terrible word) on her sleeves, in particular Annie Lennox, and strangely Chrissie Hynde. It’s truly hard to hear the opening track “Ship to Wreck” without thinking of The Pretenders. Now that might not excite you, but I caught a recent show from them on Palladia when a little tipsy a few months back and I enjoyed the hell out of it. It was Hynde, the drummer, and two guys who looked young enough to be their backstage-created-love-children and they were still pretty damn impressive. Keep on rockin’ you old bastards. But this isn’t about forgotten 80s bands, it’s about Welch, keyboards, and on this album HORNS! The title track in particular shows off their desire for new instrumentation and it’s not half bad. Again the musical differences won’t rock any boats, but we already established the band has heart rupturing vocals, what more do you people want? Greedy jerks.
Florence and the Machine may have lost guilty pleasure status for me not because I can no longer enjoy listening to them but because I no longer enjoy listening to anyone criticizing my tastes. Or actions. If I want to listen to U2 while drinking Mike’s Hard Lemonade. I’m going to do it. And if I want to drive down the highway with How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful blaring through the speakers, I’ll do that too. If you like the first two albums, I would recommend that you come join me.
The Drive: Mike’s Hard Lemonade, or whatever your guilty pleasure drink is.
Bake
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[…] Florence & Machine | How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful – Unless Florence Welch’s voice has a Steven Tyler-esque decline any album that she puts out […]