Florence + The Machine have just unveiled a new track, written in collaboration with legendary film director Tim Burton for his new movie Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children.
Titled Wish That You Were Here, the song sees Florence Welch and company work closely with Burton to ensure the track reflects the underlying themes of the director’s latest project.
In a press release (via Consequence Of Sound), Welch says that the song (below) is “about the idea that love is a journey and a risk”.
“Having been on tour, I’ve lived in a sort of magical time bubble, where the days almost blend together,” she says.
“It’s amazing, but it comes at a cost — a cost of leaving the people you love behind for a year or two. You kind of feel like if you could sing a song into the wind, maybe the wind could take it to them in a way that you can’t with a text or a call. You just want to send your love in a different way, in a way to somehow reach the unreachable.”
A tumultuous song rife with powerful percussion and rich strings, Wish That You Were Here is the culmination of Welch’s long-held desire to work with Burton. It certainly seems like a match made in heaven, with the singer remarking that the two of them share a love of art that is “beautiful and whimsical, but with an element of darkness to it”, adding that Burton “feels like a kindred spirit”.
Welch has in fact been trying to work with the director for the better part of a decade, she says, explaining that she “actually sent him a note about six years ago”.
“I was in Australia on tour there for the first time and visited an exhibition of all his work. I wanted to leave him a message and all I had on me was an x-ray of my hand, as I had just broken my finger,” she says.
“So I wrote on the x-ray and gave it to the gallery to pass on and never knew if he got it. When we met for the first time, he told me it’s been hanging up in his office ever since.”
Burton’s film Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children hits Aussie theatres on Thursday, 29th September, with Wish That You Were Here for sale digitally from today. Have a listen to the track for yourself, below.
Listen: Florence + The Machine – ‘Wish That You Were Here’
