It’s the second single from their upcoming fifth album.
After last month’s “King”, Florence + The Machine are back with “Heaven Is Here”, the second single from their upcoming fifth album. The Mystical Stomper is the first song singer Florence Welch wrote during the COVID-19 lockdown, when she didn’t have access to recording studios, and she really dreamed big.
“I wanted to do something monstrous,” Welch said in a statement. “And that clamor of joy, fury and grief was the first thing that came out. Since the dance studios are also closed, it was my dream to one day create a choreography with it. So it was one of the first pieces of music that I did specifically with contemporary dance in mind.
Florence produced the song alongside Jack Antonoff, Kid Harpoon and Glass Animals lead singer Dave Bayley. Welch’s urgent, empowering, and vaguely sinister lyrics are propelled by restless handclaps and slamming percussion, as well as piano and acoustic guitar.
Welch is recorded as having started a coven of witches as a middle schooler, and the song’s opening verse finds her poised to cast spells.
Oh, bring your salt, bring your cigarette
Draw me a circle and I’ll protect
Heaven is there if you want it
She sounds almost biblical in the third verse, which includes some of her trademark water imagery.
And all the fish, let them wade
I went to the water, I drank every drop
I will turn your sea into a desert
In the fourth and final verse, Welch portrays himself as a glamorous force of nature, or perhaps supernature.
Taste more Catholic than the Devil
All golden and golden, yes I’m your girl
Hell, if it shines, I’m leaving
Welch continues in this vein on the bridge, where she plays with the traditionally masculine image of the cowboy or the Canadian Mounted Police.
And I roll around in my red dress
And time stretches endlessly
With my gun in hand
You know I still got my man
The “Heaven Is Here” music video, directed by Autumn de Wilde, features a pair of dancers who are “currently taking refuge” in Ukraine, according to Welch. “[T]o my brave and beautiful sisters Marine and Nastia – I love you,” Welch said in her statement. “I wish I could put my arms around you.”
You can check out all the lyrics of “Heaven Is Here” on Genius now.
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