Florence Welch: Her 10 Best Songs

10. Swimming

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2pSFd-K4uU Something that's remarkable about many of Florence's songs is that they're not 'songs' in the traditional sense of the word at all, often just a series of notes that have more in common with house or classical music than they do with pop. "Swimming" is a great example of this, a lilting, circular tune that sounds like it was written on a Casio keyboard with dreams of one day getting the London Philharmonic to play it. It was sadly thrown away as a bonus song, not making final line up on "Lungs", which is real a shame because this is Flo finding her flow and it's wonderful, comparing love to finding your feet in the water, ebbing and flowing, going under, gasping for breath, but finally finding the shore. There's a thrillingly dramatic middle section where the music matches the words perfectly, literally stopping for breath, getting ones bearings back and then swimming to safety - "Then all of a sudden, I heard a note / It started in my chest and ended in my throat / Then I realized, then I realized, then I realized, I was swimming, yes, I was swimming". Nature is a recurrent them in Florence's songs - particularly water. There are references to drowning throughout €“ literally comparing her love stories to matters of life and death, but "Swimming" is a life affirming song that you should play if you've had a crappy day, trust me, it'll cheer you up.