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Home , Ceremonials, Emile Haynie, High as Hope

Florence + The Machine VIRGIN EMI SALES: 109,385 (OCC) PEAK CHART POSITION: No.2 PREVIE W

When it came to the return of Florence + The Machine, decided to mix things up for No.4. Co-producing High As Hope herself alongside (, ), thehe result was a captivating comeback. Here Virgin EMI president Ted Cockle recalls how it came to life…

 INTERVIEW: GEORGE GARNER TED COCKLE (PRESIDENT, VIRGIN EMI): “We’re months ago. It’s on the BBC Radio 1 playlist and it’s delighted this is 10 years of Florence being nominated in getting strong reactions. the BRITs environment. In pop music life-cycles – like There have been so many amazing moments [to dogs’ – it’s like 70 years to be there for 10! She won in the campaign]. The Florence/Mick Jagger connection 2010 for her debut, Lungs, she was nominated in 2012 is sizeable – it's always pretty phenomenal when that for , in 2016 for How Big, How Blue, How comes together [Florence supported Beautiful and now this record for 2019. Looking at her at the Principality Stadium in 2018]. For her to be a “There remains a purity of contemporaries in the category, she’s certainly the multiple Mercury nominated artist remains incredibly Florence’s expression that frontrunner in that regard. I’m delighted in terms of important to Florence, too. Then there’s South London is completely unfazed by quite how international she is compared to some of the Forever on the album, which was deeply personal, so we others. Australia has always been incredibly hospitable did a show at the The Joiners Arms in Camberwell for commercial expectation” to her, and she still has the whole of her European arena her to reconnect with where she was from. tour and US touring still to come. She’s had some big We’re just delighted High As Hope has had as much TED COCKLE, VIRGIN EMI moments in Hyde Park historically, too, so she’s looking impact as it has when she’s definitely swimming against forward to British Summer Time. the tide in everything she does. There isn’t a hip-hop I go deep with Florence and, after many, many blessing to her, there is no celebrity partner; she’s years, I continue to believe everything about her as an trading with the one currency she has, which is the artist. Some people become professional performers, music. And there aren’t that many that exist in that way. but she plays the role of the artist, performer, writer She’s unique in this category.” and producer. Florence’s records have always been an expression of her at all times, and she ended up Hope votes: Florence Welch co-producing this with Emile Haynie. I think she was always doing it, and there’s just been a growing confidence to go, ‘I can do this’ – it's the incremental process of her recognising the scale of her contribution. I had the pleasure of an afternoon with her at RAK Studios when she played High As Hope to us. From the moment we heard Hunger we knew that we had something – it was incredible. Hunger, whether you’re into Florence or not, is a euphoric number. It’s a big, big record on every level. I heard it and went, ‘Bloody hell, that’s killer Florence! I can hear that all over the radio’, and she’s like, ‘That was just me telling the story of dealing with food issues’. She doesn’t sing the first line in the video [‘At 17 I started to starve myself/I thought that love was a kind of emptiness’]. There remains a purity of her expression that is still completely unfazed by commercial expectation. She continues to pay no real focus to a wider world other than the reality of her life. And very few manage to do that. The beauty and innocence of her is that she’s still completely naïve to the requirements of the world. I’m not saying she doesn’t want to play the biggest venues she can possibly play – that’s her agenda – but the process by which it connects? There is nothing choreographed about that. That’s why I still believe her. High As Hope sonically leant itself to the perfect marketing plan. We had 10 majestic tracks and then [we planned] some fireworks of fun and excitement across the summer. We wanted to go from the album, which is beautiful, into some summer [sounding material]. She has the ability to have one foot on the dancefloor and still have one foot with the band and a traditional musical set-up. We would have liked to have a dance one, straight into a Stonesy one and then one more. All those records were made within the process but, sonically, didn’t fit the album. We’ve just come out with Moderation, which was meant to come about five

musicweek.com 18.02.19 | 27