When I was 13, I had a boyfriend. Yes, stop clutching your pearls.

He was a Van der Merwe, nogal. He was from the wrong side of the tracks and in Newcastle, the wrong side of the tracks, was very wrong. But his heart was in the right place. He was a romantic, a gentle soul, with a lot of swagger to boot.

He would steal his mom’s Mercedes and drive to my neck of the woods. Yes, at 13. At an agreed dark and mysterious time, he would drop a tape through our sitting room window, a window which I had left open of course. I would pretend to go to the guest loo but in fact scoop up the newest Bruce Springsteen album he ‘taped’ for me.

You see, his older brother was a koffiemoffie. (I have permission to use that word and where I got permission is none of your business.) This brother would buy Bruce Springsteen vinyl and bring it home to Van. This was before Dancing in the dark broke on our shores. Nobody in my neck of the woods had even heard of The Boss.

I would listen to this man singing about working class America, fighting with his father, and the Vietnam War. The music was good, but the lyrics were fucking great. I was mesmerised by this foreign world.

Move along a few years and 15-year-old me discovers Bob Dylan in the Alberton Library. Once again, the lyrics overwhelm, educate, break down and build up. From there I am swept away by Tori Amos and her complex, crazy music. I spent hours listening, reading the lyrics, studying the CD covers. I mean, I still remember where I was when I heard her for the first time. In the car on the way to varsity.

Anyway, life goes on and one does not always have the time to dim the lights, lie in the dark and listen to a whole album from start to finish. Let alone taking out the booklet and study every word and image.

That is until tonight.

I was slurping up pasta and listening to a new album using the AppleMusic app. Two songs in I switch to the lyrics display. I suddenly realise it is time to dim the lights, sit in the dark and listen to a whole album from start to finish. It is too fucking phenomenal to eat pasta to.

I give you Dance Fever by Florence + the Machine.

I was already moved by the three videos that dropped before the release of the album. Take the time to first watch these works of art.

I mean, who the fuck has Bill Nighy playing their anxiety?