‘On stage, she says, she always felt absolved – nobody was angry with her up there. It was her offstage life that she had to work on. Up there she will climb the scaffolding, holding on with one hand, leaping into the crowd and ripping her top off when she gets too sweaty. After those nights it’s quite hard for her to return to earth. Everything, she explains, starts to take on a magical significance. There will be moments – sitting in a friend’s room watching TV, for instance – when, sleep-deprived and sober, she will be suddenly awed. “Mundane moments become incredibly profound. The performing, the transcendence, then sitting watching TV – all can coexist, and the mundane makes the magical. Maybe I’m trying to hold on to normalcy. Maybe because being onstage has become normal, the pockets of peace seem really wild. But I treasure them.”’ - Florence Welch photographed by Phil Fisk for The Observer (June 2018)
