Florence Welch has shed light on a reference to The 1975 on the latest Florence + The Machine album.
The musician recently sat down with Rolling Stone‘s Brittany Spanos for a live interview at New York’s Cherry Lane Theatre, which took place a week before the release of the group’s sixth full-length album, ‘Everybody Scream’, which arrived yesterday (October 31).
Spanos praised Welch’s use of humour on the album, referencing the lines: “Breaking my bones/Getting four out of five/Listening to a song by the 1975/I thought, ‘Fuck it, I might as well give music by men a try,” on ‘Music by Men‘. She then asked Welch which track she was listening to at the time.
“We’re fucking in a car/Shooting heroin/Saying controversial things ,” she sang, sounding out ‘A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships‘ track ‘Love It If We Made It’.
“I was like, ‘This song is really good,’” she laughed. “A big thing with songwriting is it’s often because it rhymes. So you needed a band that rhymed with five.”
As for the lyric about her broken bones, she explained: “When I broke my foot onstage, I got four out of five stars for that show. I was like, ‘What more do I have to do?’ I literally bled all over the stage.
“People were mopping it up and I finished the fucking show, and I think across the board it was like, ‘Four out of five’. Fuck’s sake. What now?”
Further along in the discussion, Spanos turned her attention to the writing on ‘One of the Greats’, where Welch sings: “I’ll be up there with the man and the 10 other women and the 100 greatest records of all time/It must be nice to be a man and make boring music just because you can.”
“A lot of the lines in there,” said Welch, “I just found them really funny. It was this feeling of ‘When is it going to be good enough?’ I give so much, and sometimes I wonder if in that giving and in not having that almost masculine cool of holding stuff back, being obtuse, not saying it all like, ‘What is he saying? That’s so cool. What do those lyrics mean?’… I was like, “If I keep giving this much, does that mean people aren’t taking me seriously?”
But then sometimes when I listen to things that have that level of masculine reserve, I’m just like, “Isn’t this kind of boring though? What are they saying?”
Maybe it would be an easier life to be able to hold things back, to be able to just be hot in a T-shirt and everyone be like, “Wow, it’s revolutionary.” I’m jealous. If you’re insulting someone, it comes from envy, honestly.
Welch previously revealed that the inspiration for the ‘Everybody Scream’ album came from undergoing lifesaving surgery during the ‘Dance Fever’ tour in 2023.
She has since opened up further about the procedure, revealing that she had suffered an ectopic pregnancy. An ectopic pregnancy occurs when the fertilised egg is implanted in a fallopian tube, rather than the uterus. It’s uncommon, happening in only around 1 in 90 pregnancies, per the NHS.
“The closest I came to making life was the closest I came to death,” Welch explained in a recent interview. “And I felt like I had stepped through this door, and it was just full of women, screaming.”
You can find more advice and support around ectopic pregnancy here.
Around that same time, Welch had said that exploring spiritual mysticism and folk horror helped inspire the album – understanding the limits of her body and questioning what it meant to be “healed”. Other themes tackled include the exploration of womanhood, partnership, ageing and dying.
NME gave the record a full five stars, with Laura Molloy writing: “There’s no easy, radio-friendly hit here, nor a euphoric finale, with the album instead departing on a small exhale. “The gift of going through something awful is that you can embrace someone who’s been through it too,” Welch said in a recent interview.
“Album closer ‘And Love’, then, is her final embrace, fluttering away in a haze of classic Florence + The Machine harp and distant murmurs of “peace is coming”. It’s a succinct and surprising end to a tempestuous record, one that stays with you longer than the rage and anguish which, here, is as fleeting, yet deeply magical, as the changing seasons.”
Florence + The Machine are set to embark on a UK and European arena tour in February, which includes two nights at The O2 in London – find any remaining tickets here.
Last week, they also unveiled North American tour dates for 2026, with support coming from Rachel Chinouriri, SOFIA ISELLA, CMAT and Mannequin Pussy. Tickets for those dates go on sale on November 5 at 10am local time, and will be available here.
