Florence + The Machine, Hackney Empire - review - Music - Arts

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The second album, however, is a notoriously tricky customer.

Last night in their only British show of 2011, Welch and her nine Machinists (including jackhammer percussionist and fearsome harpist) introduced that second album, Ceremonials.

As launches before sold-out, adoring audiences go, it transformed Hackney Empire into Cape Canaveral.

Although there was no room for You Got The Love or Kiss With A Fist, old favourites Dog Days Are Over and Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up) were gloriously rebooted, but the new material glowed. These are mighty songs for hard times, from the epic Only If For A Night to the transcendent paean to hedonism that was Lover To Lover, the only Ceremonials song, she explained, not concerning guilt.

At the centre of the maelstrom was Welch, still only 25 but a big enough personality to handle those big songs. Her voice, operatic in Leave My Body; conventionally rocky in No Light, No Light tumbled around itself, but never lost focus.

Whether gambolling across stage or twirling like Julie Andrews in The Sound Of Music, she exuded the aura of a good witch, giddy at the wonder of her music, albeit with an undercurrent of sex.

And, at the end of the gripping Heartlines, when she seemed to be the missing link between a Botticelli model and a Greek goddess, she walked into her microphone stand and started giggling like the new girl at school.

Even with the distraction of TV cameras, this was a bewitching performance. Put your house on her in 2012.

Florence + The Machine
Hackney Empire
Mare Street, E8 1EJ