Yes I’m a Control freak

Florence Walsh is brimming with a girl-next-door charm as she talks to Ed Power about fame and fortune, but her family life is strictly off-limits

POP star Florence Welch cuts a surprisingly understated figure. She is dressed simply, plainly, her speaking voice so low you have to strain to hear. Of the flame-haired, rock Valkyrie, an overnight success who has sold four million albums, there is little trace. If you didn’t know better, you might suspect she’d sent an introverted double in her stead.

Not that Welch, who performs as Florence and the Machine, is a recalcitrant interviewee. Hours before her biggest headline show to date, down the road at a sold-out O2, she speaks forthrightly on a variety of topics. The only time she withdraws is when conversation turns to her fashion-world chum, designer Karl Lagerfeld, and his claim that Adele is ‘fat’.