Florence + The Machine

As much an individual project as a band, Florence = the Machine (or Florence and the Machine) brings together singer, songwriter and keyboard player Florence Welch (born in Camberwell, London, August 28, 1986), her songwriting partner Isabella Summers (until 2015) and, in her early days, percussionist Christopher Lloyd Hayden. Their critically acclaimed debut album, Lungs (2009), was produced by James Ford and Paul Epworth, and debuted at number one in the UK. The same team was reunited two years later on Ceremonials (2011), drawing inspiration from synth pop and alternative rock, with a hint of gothic spirit. The Florence + the Machine craze reaches the U.S., where the album reaches No. 6 on the Billboard charts, and features the iconic tracks "What the Water Gave Me" and "Shake It Out". In 2012, the acoustic session MTV Unplugged was released, followed three years later by the third album How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful (2015), featuring an impressive array of musicians around the same production team augmented by Markus Dravs, Kid Harpoon and Dan Wilson. Rated #1 in the UK, it was the first to sit atop the US Billboard 200. The band then becomes the instrument of Florence Welch, sole master on High as Hope (2018), but surrounded by numerous outside collaborators (Thomas Bartlett, Jamie xx, Tobias Jesso Jr., Jonathan Wilson, Greg Leisz, Kamasi Washington, Sampha and Father John Misty) and a new producer in the person of Emile Haynie. Four years later, the multi-instrumentalist surrounded herself with her regular collaborators (Kid Harpoon, Thomas Bartlett aka Doveman) and producer Jack Antonoff to produce Dance Fever (2022), an eclectic, rock-dominated fifth opus ranked #1 in the U.K. and #7 in the U.S. (#1 on Top Alternative Albums and Top Rock Albums). Following the tour, the band performs at the BBC Proms, accompanied by the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Jules Buckley, to deliver a symphonic version of their first album, resulting in the 2024 release of Symphony of Lungs: BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall.