She doesn’t always emerge unscathed, but at least she’s alive. Each new Florence and the Machine album opens on Florence Welch in the aftermath of a tsunami, attempting to make sense of her circumstances as she prepares to charge forth into the unknown. The London band’s sixth album, Everybody Scream, is again dedicated to finding strength in release from physical and psychological inhibitions. If you’re a fan of the band’s arena-pop baroque, you’ll get what you came for: horizon-spanning anthems of resilience furnished with cinematic strings, gargantuan drums, and, yes, the occasional scream. Nearly every song rests on this sturdy foundation, and Welch’s voice ignites each into a raging wildfire.
“There’s a feeling of dying a little bit, every time I make a record,” Welch told The Guardian earlier this year. “And, this time, I nearly died.” That’s not hyperbole: While touring Dance Fever in 2023, Welch underwent life-saving surgery, which she’s now revealed was due to massive internal bleeding caused by an ectopic pregnancy. The trauma of miscarriage is evident in the fury that fuels Everybody Scream: “Sometimes my body seems so alien to me,” Welch sings over the steady chug of “Kraken,” sounding despairingly numb before transforming into a creature of wrath. On “The Old Religion,” she dreams of immateriality, yearning to be free of her physical self so long as it means relief from pain.
Swelling strings, sweeping choruses, and Welch’s mythical timbre abound. Idles’ Mark Bowen and the National’s Aaron Dessner handle the bulk of the album’s production (though Mitski makes a cameo on the title track and “Buckle”). Bowen’s influence suggests itself in a slightly more raucous approach, at least by Florence and the Machine standards. The opening title track springs from cascading harp to monstrous drones as it celebrates the safe haven of the concert hall, much like Dance Fever’s “Free.” Perhaps Welch’s whiteboard musings—notably one that read “Swans vs Adele”—inspired a batch of songs with a primordial edge. The clearest example, “Drink Deep,” drives a drill into the earth’s core as Welch’s quivering melisma becomes an incantation, somewhat like the ominous commands of Michael Gira.
