"Ship to Wreck" is a song by English
indie rock band
Florence and the Machine from their third studio album, How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful (2015). It was released on 9 April 2015 as the album's second single. The track premiered on
Huw Stephens' show on
BBC Radio 1 on 8 April 2015 and the accompanying music video was released on 13 April, following the narrative of band's previous two videos of "
What Kind of Man" and "St. Jude". The video was filmed in frontwoman
Florence Welch's London house.[1][2]
"Ship to Wreck" is a
folk rock,[3]pop rock,[4] and
soft rock[5] song that carries an "upbeat, bouncy sound", in contrast to the lyrics, which speak of
self-destructive behaviour.[6] The song almost did not make the cut for How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, as producer
Markus Dravs had disallowed Welch to write more songs about water, a recurring theme in the band's previous album, Ceremonials (2011), but she managed to include it.[7] In a press release, Welch explained the meaning behind the song, saying: "I was thinking about my own self destructive side, and how you can make something only to tear it down, enjoy/destroy, create/devastate etc. When you're in that whirlwind, you often end up breaking the thing you love the most."[8]
Critical reception
Jason Lipshutz of Billboard included "Ship to Wreck" on its "Top 10 Songs of 2015 (So Far)" list in June 2015, stating, "Florence Welch may have reached a new peak with third album How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful—she's certainly never been more effective as a live performer, and 'Ship To Wreck' demonstrates that she's still growing as a pop songwriter. Everything comes together for Florence + The Machine on their latest single, as Welch's voice coils around the slender arrangement and squeezes hard on the chorus."[9]Rolling Stone ranked "Ship to Wreck" at number 26 on its list of the "50 Best Songs of 2015".[10] The song also reached number 40 on the annual
Triple J Hottest 100 for 2015.[11]
Commercial performance
As of July 2018, "Ship to Wreck" had shifted 279,000 units in the United Kingdom, including 17 million streams, and counting.[12]