Queen of Peace

Album: How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful (2015)
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Songfacts®:

  • How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful contains a number of songs inspired by Florence Welch's own experience of a toxic relationship. On the face of it, this song details the bittersweet victory of a king and queen in a battle who despite winning, lost their son in the conflict. However, it seems Welch is comparing the royal anguish to her suffering in the relationship that is driving her away.
  • Rolling Stone asked Welch about the songs on that album that concern her being in a relationship with someone who is driving you away. She replied: "I had to experience it. I wouldn't wish it on someone, but when you make something out of it, that's what it was all for, I guess. The songs become these talismans, little spells that you've written that are just for yourself. And you can carry them with you."
  • The two-part video begins with this song and flows into another How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful track "Long & Lost." The 10-minute epic was shot by long-time Florence collaborator Vincent Haycock, and filmed on the tiny Scottish isle of Easdale in the Inner Hebrides.

    Haycock noted that the island's scenery served as inspiration for the clip. "The coast of Scotland is breathtaking, beautiful and harsh, an aesthetic mix that both Florence and I have been very interested in during the making of these videos", he said. "The Scottish people are amazing and especially the town of Easdale, the small island that we lived on and filmed in."

    The clip shows Florence Welch trying to appease a group of combative local men and comforting a family troubled by loss before she's shipped off to sea for her own safety. "We shot in the winter and it was cold, brutal and endlessly inspiring, which I think really helped the story of Florence's struggle with her family, the younger innocence vs. the feuding violence of the men around her," said Haycock.

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