Florence + The Machine research

I've decided on Shake it Out as my song

The Estoteric Meaning of Shake It Out

Second, there is a definite occult influence in her music but it is not hidden or concealed, but rather all out in the open. In an interview with Nylon magazine, Florence stated:“I wanted to be a witch when I was a kid. I was obsessed with witchcraft. At school, me and my two friends had these spell books; I always wanted a more magical reality. I had a little shrine at home and I did a spell to try and make the boy in the other class fall in love with me.”
Despite this known fact, I never found any review or analysis of Florence + the Machine’s work from an occult point of view, a field Florence Welch is obviously well versed in. The videos of her first album Lungs had some occult concepts infused into them. For example, her hit Dog Days are Over alludes to the dog star Sirius, an all-important celestial body in esoteric teachings (for more information, read the article entitled The Mysterious Connection Between Sirius and Human History). An article on Pseudo-Occult media described some of the occult and MK aspects of the videos from her first album – centered around the imagery of white rabbits, bird cages, Alice in Wonderland and so forth – so I won’t dwell on those. Her second album, Ceremonials, is slightly darker and more focused on profound esoteric concepts that deserve some analyzing.
The videos of Shake it Out and No Light No Light both contain enigmatic imagery (see the confused comments on YouTube) that relate to ancient occult concepts. Analyzed from an esoteric point of view, both videos can indeed by seen as “ceremonies” where symbols and colors describe a story of profound transformation. The imagery of Shake it Out tell the story of an initiation ritual in a strange secret society.

Taking place in a strange masquerade ball with masked guests – reminiscent of the secret society orgy in the movie “Eyes Wide Shut” –  Shake it Out follows Florence’s evolution. From being shy and reserved, she becomes ecstatic and almost demented. In an interview, Welch described the video’s setting this way:“Think of a psychedelic 1920s dress party with a demonic twist. Possession meets The Great Gatsby. (…) We were kind of going for a sort of ‘Gatsby at West Egg’-style house party but with maybe slightly ritualistic and sort of satanic undertones and séances.”In this strange setting, there are several Florences, with different personalities and wearing dresses with symbolic colors. Each of them tell a different part of the story of Florence’s initiation and its results. As we have seen in previous articles on this site, the theme of initiation is often found in modern pop videos and there is one thing they all have in common: a focus on the colors white, red and black. This video is no exception as the color of Florence’s dresses tell a lot about the meaning of the character she is embodying. 
The lyrics of the song sustain the overall theme of these kinds of initiations as they pertain to the abandoning of a dark past and the embracing of a new life. Some parts of the song are particularly interesting as they appear to allude to specific aspects to Masonic initiations. This following passage refers to candidates being “in the dark” before the completion of the initiation.

There's more info about the masks- representing hypnos (god of sleep) and specific lyrics that related to initiation ceremonies, and the gold/red/white/black dresses and the importance of balance and duality

Genius lyrics

The 1st official single from Florence and the Machine’s 2nd album Ceremonials.Voted as “2012 Track of the Year” by NME magazine, the song was favourably received. The uplifting yet mournful sound is matched by lyrics depicting twisted clichés. The song was wrote whilst Florence Welch was suffering from a hangover, evident through the chorus – she describes singing the song as “cathartic”.

some annotations of certain lyrics:

• Regrets are possibly the worst kind of memories you can have. They can come back to you at anytime and anywhere, and can be hard to push away into the back of your head. 

• Florence wrote this song whilst hungover. She stated during an interview on US talk show Chelsea Lately that a hangover brings you to a whole new world, allowing you to access new areas of your brain. In her own words:" You build up all the experiences and then have enough regrets to write songs about them."

• The future is daunting; her path is dark. She’s unable to see the light through all the demons that have come back to haunt her.
• Florence admits to being naive. And that the mistakes and moves she has made in the past will never escape her.
• Two meaning are present:
• -Shaking the devils of regrets off her back. It’s a metaphor for moving on and letting go of her past problems. 

• -Literally, this refers to “shaking out” the sluggish feeling of a hangover; Florence was in a hangover when writing this song.

• What matters here is the metaphorical meaning. It’s a simple, inspirational phrase. Dance with them, not for them. Shake off your regrets and dance! 
• Florence has emphasised the importance of this lyric ("What the hell") in her interviews. She explain that sometimes you just can’t move on, you simply have to face the fact you might make a mistake again. This time embrace it.“‘What the hell’ is really important as well, because you’ll dance with the devil again at some point, and maybe it will be fun. I’ve heard he does a really good foxtrot.” – Florence Welch
• She said in an interview about this song that the “devil has a nice foxtrot” – he is charismatic and smooth and intriguing. There is an enigmatic romance in her “relationship” with the devil, but she recognizes how it leaves her in a darker place than where she started.
• Looking for heaven (a good time whilst out drinking), actually brings the devil (a bad hangover on the morning after). It’s a paradoxical phrase out of context (how can you find a devil in heaven?), but it works when compared with reality.

Songfacts.com 

This video piece is all about these processions and it's kind of colour based and everyone's wearing masks and there's all kinds of different colours...coloured balloons...and strange ceremonies going on. That word - ceremonies - got stuck in my head. And then went it came to this album which was influenced by hymns and poems and sounds of church bells. There's kind a lot of ceremonial influences and aspects to it, so it seemed to fit."

MTV article

"I think I came to the studio with a bit of a hangover, and it was one of those strange days where you're not really sure where a song comes from," she explained. "[Producer] Paul [Epwoth] just had these chords on the organ, and they sounded optimistic and sad at the same time. And I was thinking of regrets, like, you know when you feel like you're stuck in yourself, you keep repeating certain patterns of behavior, and you kind of want to cut out that part of you and restart yourself.

"So this song was kind of like, 'Shake yourself out of it, things will be OK,' " she continued. "[Because] sometimes I have to write songs for myself, reminding me to let it go. But then, the end refrain of 'What the hell' is really important as well, because you'll dance with the devil again at some point, and maybe it will be fun. I've heard he does a really good foxtrot."

And in keeping with that last point, Florence (and her Machine) made it a priority to get devilish with the "Shake It Out" video, which was shot in the grandiose Eltham Palace and was, by all accounts, a pretty excellent party — one that, like most of Ceremonials, seemed to span space and time.

"We were kind of going for a sort of 'Gatsby at West Egg'-style house party but with maybe slightly ritualistic and sort of satanic undertones and séances," she laughed. "That was such a fun video to shoot, for me especially, because I had all my friends down there, and they all came and we all got to dress up and do a casual séance in this beautiful art-deco mansion. It's basically a party house; there's one room which was purely just for cutting flowers. My best friend is sitting with me in the tree at the end of the video, and we just got to hang out in a tree for a while. It was really fun."



I also found some sheet music and started learning it (on piano), since that helps me understand songs in the tone/mood/etc kind of way which might be helpful.