Florence & The Machine Live at The Olympia, Dublin
Florence Live: a gypsy, a witch and a diva
Celina Murphy, 20 May 2010
I was standing in this exact spot just five months ago. Same venue, same tunes, same fans. Same kooky geriatric backdrop, same lightbulbs blazing from within the same elegant bird cages.
Same set-up but a very different Florence.
Clad in a modest white lace gown (albeit donned over a pair of racy gold shorts), a billowing scarf always draped over some part of her body and her copper hair piled up in Heidi braids, Flo knows the look’s important. But not to the point that she feels the need to flood us with costume changes, or even check to see that her apparel hasn’t come off in the throes of performance.
The only tangible advancement in The Cosmic Love Tour stage show is the presence of a string sextet, who play along to around a third of the tracks from behind a Perspex screen, including pre-Lungs tune ‘Swimming’ and the ever-joyous ‘You’ve Got The Love’. Later, their theatrical chimes add great depth to the show-stoppingly epic ‘Cosmic Love’, during which Welch’s Granny chic backdrop lifts to reveal a sheet of twinkling constellations.
“This is so exciting,” she chirps, “I’m gonna have to take my hair down!” and by God, she’s about the only person in the world who could have pulled off a stunt this corny.
Mistress Welch’s lungs are in tip top shape tonight, bearing none of those quivers of fatigue we heard during her last trip to our shores, the Meteor Awards in February. She reaches her vocal precipice on violent new war chant ‘Strangeness And Charm’, which whets appetites nicely for album number two.
As the show draws to a close, the crowd begin to hurl assorted items at their musical matriarch.
“I’ve got gloves… a chain and even a packet of crisps!” Flo squeaks. “All in all, it’s like Christmas!”
This prompts the two blokes in front of me to share a man hug – it seems for about 1,500 super fans, the feeling’s completely mutual.
Remarkably, five short months ago, our Flossie fluctuated between throwing wildly possessed shapes and hunching crosslegged over the microphone, fidgeting with her skirt. Tonight, she’s a gypsy, a witch and a diva. In short, she’s arrived.
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