Florence + The Machine Unveil Powerful Short Film For ‘Queen Of Peace’ & ‘Long And Lost’

Hot on the heels of their headlining performance at this year’s Splendour In The Grass festival, Florence + The Machine have dropped a gripping cinematic double-feature music video for the tracks Queen Of Peace and Long And Lost off their recently-released album, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful.

The epic short film, which was directed by frequent collaborator Vincent Haycock (who also shot the group’s St. Jude, What Kind of Man, and Ship To Wreck clips), stars Florence Welch as a Scottish country-woman who struggles to appease a town ravaged by gang violence, and a family besieged by loss. It’s a sure-fire tear jerker so get those tissues ready. I’m talking to you, Dave Grohl.

The singer uses interpretive dance, but not in a creepy Ken-Jeong-at-the-MTV-Movie-Awards kind of way, to convey a powerful story of violence and heartbreak, set against the breathtaking countryside of Scotland’s Easdale Island, whose cliffs we see continuously pummelled by rough surf in some of the film’s many visually striking and poetic visuals.

“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,” explained Haycock (via Consequence Of Sound).

“The Scottish people are amazing and especially the town of Easdale, the small island that we lived on and filmed. 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, etc.”

“The end of the video was done in a single take, at the very last seconds of light during a stormy barge ride on a freezing sea,” he continued. “The effort and focus on both the actors and crew was so amazing, Florence delivers one of my favourite moments to date and it’s one of my proudest technical and narrative accomplishments.”

After conquering Splendour, Florence + The Machine have already announced plans to return to Australian shores for a headlining tour before the year is out. Check out their freshly announced tour dates here.

Or, if you’ve got a spare 10 minutes, feast your eyes on the full music video for Queen Of Peace and Long And Lost, below.

Watch: Florence + The Machine – Queen Of Peace and Long And Lost (The Odyssey Chapters 4 & 5)

Gallery: Florence + The Machine @ Splendour in the Grass 2015 / Photos By Yael Stampler