Everybody Scream by Florence + The Machine

I fell in love with Florence + The Machine’s trademark sorcerous chamber pop sound. With each album, Welch has come into her own. Coming off her prior album, Dance Fever, Florence suffered a life-threatening ectopic pregnancy that flooded her with a bevy of complex emotions. These fears and anger seep out of her latest album, Everybody Scream. Her magic presence now parts the miasma of darkness that once surrounded her on this collection of more foreboding tracks. Florence admits to L’Officiel that the experience brought with it a newfound fascination with the ancient witchcraft practices of the British Isles that she wanted to weave into this project:

“Modern medicine saved my life, but people couldn’t really tell me why. I had to find meaning. I became really interested in witchcraft, magic, and medicine, because what happened to me was so violent. I wanted to study the different forms of healing, which led me down a path of exploring esoteric and pagan rituals as well as British occultism. I also spent a lot of time researching at The Warburg Institute [a research center in London]. It was my way through the two years, figuring out how to stitch that into the album and make meaning of [the experience].” — Florence Welch via L’Officiel (2025)

I absolutely adore the mystical spiral of sound that engulfs you on the opening track, “Everybody Scream.” Heavy chants materialize a crowd in hypnotic delight as ribbons of grandiose orchestrations combine with the band to ignite this incantation that Florence wafts over you. Welch divulged to Zane Lowe that she wanted something that bridged the foreboding and beautiful sonic realms:

“I think was I was looking for was an ominous feeling but that also has clarity and beauty and those incredible soaring choruses, like Adele and incredible ballads. We were looking a lot a pop as well and the amazing things that are happening in pop like, well, it’s so experimental at the moment. We were listening to ‘Angel of My Dreams’ by JADE in studio and it was just like pulling all those things together.” — Florence Welch via Interview with Zane Lowe (2025)

Lyrically, it depicts the rush of endorphins she gets performing in front of a crowd. That spell that hangs over the arrangement is meant to display two-fold how both Welch and the crowd go into this primal state when the music starts playing. It’s the theatricality that I appreciate the most.

“One of the Greats” deconstructs the dream of infamy and the costs this wish lays on those who are granted it. Welch lays bare her many resentments of clawing violently to the top and watching her male counterparts achieve the same success with a quarter of the effort. Florence told Jack Saunders of Radio 1’s New Music Show that the song came out in 1 take in an almost stream of consciousness:

“I just can’t believe I’m putting it out. It was recorded in one take and it was the first take we did. I wrote it with Mark Bowen from IDLES and he played the guitar and I just kinda sang it straight from the page and this is the take. It’s just one of those things, you’re always asking the label if you can put out a song that’s five minutes long so with this one I was like, ‘They’ll never put this out the way we really want to put this out, seven minutes long,’ but they were like, ‘Yeah, we love it,’ and I was like, ‘Okay…’ […] I guess it was sort of a long poem I had and I never really, with every song I’m like, ‘Well, I’ll never put this out, I’ll never put it out,’ but it was one long poem I wrote about greatness or the cost of it or why do I want it? Who gets to decide what that even is? And then it was also kind of a joke, so it’s like really serious and also really unserious song as well. And it kind of evolves in this train of thought and that’s very much how it was recorded but I guess I wanted it to feel like you were disintegrating into nothing at the end ’cause it is sort of about the process of creativity being like a sense you sort of destroy yourself for something and then you kind of dig yourself up all over again to do it again and you’re like, ‘Why do I keep doing this? What is this thing that I’m reaching for?’ There’s a Martha Graham quote that’s called ‘Divine dissatisfaction,’ and I think that sort of sums up the process for me, it’s this sense of this like divine dissatisfaction that just keeps propelling you forward all the time.” — Florence Welch via Radio 1’s New Music Show with Jack Saunders (2025)

Bowen’s gritty guitar work gives a sort of 70s psychedelic rock undertone as Florence rises forth through the fog. The energy that she carries behind this song channels all the women behind her who’ve poured their souls out to get half as far.

We’re pushed and pulled between life and death through desire in the haunting energy of “Witch Dance.” As a huge fan of Bat for Lashes, this song’s bewitching ingredients of tactical percussion, soaring choir, and medieval instrumentation immediately drew me in. Florence tears forth in a panic, mourning what was lost, but feverishly fighting to claim the years she’s owed in this life. After suffering a life-threatening ectopic pregnancy, much of Welch’s complex emotions now encircle the pain of what she could have had and all that could have been lost because of this experience.

“Sympathy Dance” sounds as if we’re rising from the ashes of our prior selves anew. This vibrant, earthy arrangement beams light to pierce through the dense canopy overhead to channel in this feeling of rebirth. Where fear once held us on a rigid path, this new point of view pulls back our shoulders with a new sense of pride and resolve. I hear a woman now standing tall in the wake of all chaos might seek to run right through her. I’m a sucker for the magic of the omnichord, and its position alongside this lively orchestration makes everything feel as lush and green as a field of wildflowers.

Much like the progressing seasons, “Perfume and Milk” shows the slow transformation of someone in the aftermath of prior traumas. Florence alludes to what she’s lost as being fodder for the growth of new life. Melancholia hangs heavy on her voice as we trudge through the woody, percussive motion provided by the acoustic guitar. I can smell the damp earth and fallen leaves perfume the air as Welch parts ways with the pain she once entangled herself in, as we enter the sunlight.

“Buckle” is filled to the brim with resentment and heartache. Co-written alongside singer/songwriter Mitski, much of her trademark candid lyricism and bittersweet angst color the song. Florence revealed to Absolute Radio how taken she was by Mitski’s arrangement for this track:

“Me and Mitski wrote that one and I just watched her sit there and just play it end to end on the guitar and I was like, ‘Well, that’s a song you can’t touch.’ I tried adding more production to that song, I tried adding synths, there was a world where it could’ve become more of a pop song but there was something about the quality with which, she’s one of my favorite musicians and songwriters, and there was something about the quality with which she played it, I was like, ‘I want that front and center.’” — Florence Welch via Absolute Radio (2025)

The duo unveils the story of a woman further emotionally damaged by a cold and distant man. I do love Florence’s softer vocal alongside its intimate sound, but I do think I would have preferred this more as a Mitski piece.

“Kraken” crackles with an ominous tension as Florence looks on with a sly smile, as those who counted her out now flounder in the waves. I adore how much this song calls back on the powerful indie-rock energy of her debut release. All of this is a beacon to shine on the behemoth she’s become in the industry, towering over the men who once saw her as a mere novelty in comparison. It flew me right back to my college days, albeit now with Welch’s mastered trademark enchantment.

An unrelenting curtain of rain overtakes you in gnawing hunger for something to take you out of body on “The Old Religion.” Welch is at her best when she taps into her witchy energy, and the cyclone of drums, strings, and tension-building piano makes this image come to life. It’s an undying anxiety that gravitates us back to the vices that dull the senses. This warped instinct is carried back centuries as Florence conjures man’s need to escape themselves. It’s a cinematic wonder that immediately became a favorite of mine from this album.

“Drink Deep” enweaves fairytale mysticism with the heavy price of dedicating yourself to your work. Welch divulged to Radio X how she wanted to use the threatening tales of fairies to paint how much of your interpersonal life you lose when on tour:

“So, it was sort of going I was pulling on the old, very old sort of English and Irish old folk tales where fairies were actually far more vampiric in nature and actually very frightening creatures, and I was thinking about that and in some ways how it relates also to fame and performance and I guess touring is a sense that you are away with the fairies. You know, you disappear off into this other land and you come back and people are getting married, having children, like getting older, like moving and you’re sort of like, ‘Oh my god, I’ve been dancing for too long? Did I miss my life?’ And I think it was sort of as I was writing, I basically wanted to write a straight up like folk horror tale with this one, but sort of as I was writing it, I was like, ‘Oh, am I also like thinking about performance itself?’ And I think that a big thread on this record is sort of like the sacrifices of ambition and performance and what that takes from you and what it gives to you and the wrestle of that. It’s like you find out it’s taking from you and it’s taking all your life force and you just keep going. You’re like, ‘Yeah, I’ll go back.’”— Florence Welch via Radio X (2025)

This song has the most mystical undertone of all. The slow march of drums alongside bending harmonies and foreboding chamber-like arrangements brings this story to life. It’s as if you can see the life disappear from her with each sip she takes. I really appreciate the metaphor she explores in such a grand way.

Florence deconstructs her aversion to the give and take in relationships in hopes of being a better partner in “Music by Men.” She easily admits to falling fast, but it’s the diving deeper aspect that brings in the apprehension. She begins to cloister herself off before something, be it good or bad, can form. The song has more of a Country-Western lean. Much of the sorrow she carries rests on the dusty minor chords strummed on the accompanying acoustic guitar. I think those who enjoyed the melancholia of Ethel Cain will feel right at home in Welch’s withdrawn pain.

“You Can Have It All” stings with the ache of loss a woman endures after the passing of an unborn child. It’s anger and sorrow boiling forth as you try to find control again while the earth continues to crack beneath you. Florence takes a solemn, funeral-like smog and blasts it away in a powerful emotional release in the song’s chorus. What I connect with the most is how freeing her sudden soaring voice feels. It’s as if the chains dragging you down all snap at once.

The album departs with a surrendering to surprising reaches of falling for someone in the aptly titled “And Love.” It’s interesting how love is different for everyone, unlike the clichés we know, and yet wholly the same secure joy that awakens something new inside of us. Florence taps into that nicely here. Much of the darkness now evaporates as her trademark harp casts warmth over us. It’s a welcome rest bit after bleeding out the demons of loss, resentment, and fear before this.

Much of the album satisfied that love I have for similar mystical works from artists like Bat for Lashes, Tori Amos, and Stevie Nicks. Florence is at her best when her passion intertwines the rich chamber pop arrangements like on “Everybody Scream,” “Witch Dance,” “The Old Religion,” “Drink Deep,” & “You Can Have It All.” They all sound like a ritual to cast away the pains that once poisoned you. Out of all the songs on the album, “Buckle” sounds the least cohesive. Personally, I think Mitski’s footprint is too present on this song not to make me wish for her presence. For the first album of Florence’s I’ve listened to from front to back in many years, it made for a delightful experience for someone who adores chamber pop and spellbinding alternative music.

My overall thoughts on Everybody Scream:

My rating scale: Love it = 1 point, Like it = 0.5 point, Dislike it = 0 points; Final score = total points/ number of tracks

Loved it: “Everybody Scream,” “Witch Dance,” “Sympathy Dance,” “Kraken,” “The Old Religion,” “Drink Deep,” & “You Can Have It All”

Liked it: “One of the Greats,” “Buckle,” “Music by Men,” & “And Love”

Disliked it: None

My overall rating: 7.5 out of 10.

Sources:

https://www.instagram.com/p/DNnw4WjRnT8/