Florence Finally Tops Chart, Plots New Album

The inexorable march of Florence and the Machine's debut album 'Lungs' has reached its logical conclusion -- number one in the charts, six months after the disc first hit stores.

Few sounds have been as omnipresent Florence Welch's mellifluous bellow this past half year. Five tracks from 'Lungs' have been released as singles, with a sixth, 'Hurricane Drunk,' due out in March.

She's not been short of support from the music press either. After coming third in the BBC's Sound of 2009 poll, she grabbed the Critic's Choice Award at the Brits and a Mercury Prize nomination.

Not that the big-voiced redhead plans on piping down now her persistence has been rewarded. "Being number one is amazing," Welch told the Sun. "The music world is a funny place. It's like you can now get a second shot. The first impression isn't everything and people aren't fed up of us yet. But you need to keep things fresh and I'm now working on a new album." Good luck with that one, Florence, you've set yourself quite a benchmark.

'Lungs' knocked another evergreen album of top spot -- Paolo Nutini's 'Sunny Side Up', which spent one week at number one in June only to return to the pinnacle on Jan. 3.