Florence Welch

I love performing outside because it's as if the heavens are open and the elements become part of the stage show as well - you know, the wind and the rain and the thunder. It's almost as if there's a sense of invocation in performance.

I was a heavy heart to carry_x000D_ My beloved was weighed down_x000D_ My arms around his neck_x000D_ My fingers laced to crown._x000D_ I was a heavy heart to carry_x000D_ My feet dragged across ground_x000D_ And he took me to the river_x000D_ Where he slowly let me drown_x000D_ My love has concrete feet_x000D_ My love's an iron ball_x000D_ Wrapped around your ankles _x000D_ Over the waterfall

I don't want your future,_x000D_ I don't need your past._x000D_ One bright moment_x000D_ Is all I ask.

My visual landscape as a child was the inside of a lot of these old churches. And the Baroque drama of the things was what I was first engaging with artwise. I'm much more attracted to the aesthetic of religious iconography than the actual religious side. The passion and the blood and the violence and the gaudy side of it I find really fascinating.

Music is my way out. I keep things locked up and never say anything. I guess in order to say something to one person, I have to sing it to a couple of thousand. It doesn't make for healthy relationships.

The stage is a place where I can be wholly myself. Even though you're in front of people almost to be judged, it is a place without judgement.

When something really hits me, it makes me want to either jump off something really high or lie down and be buried. I want people to get hit and caught by my music.

I have this sensation of being in flight all the time, but being on stage is like creating a sanctuary in which you can completely lose yourself. The bits of your personality that you keep under wraps in ordinary life, you can let them run free.

Having a soul, they say, is like taking sadness and turning it into something beautiful.

I can’t worry too much about the everyday things. Otherwise I’d lose touch with my own world, that helps me as an artist, but it’s frustrating for the people around me. I’m vaguely functional, but there’s always something slightly off.