Back in 2004, when we were all much less depressed and resigned about that certain planetary and socioeconomical hellhole towards which the world is inexorably slumping, there was a London band called Flotation Toy Warning – even the name alone conjures a completely different world view.
Highly experimental and melodically gloomy yet filled with just enough irreverent glee, fantasy, and theremin, Bluffer’s Guide to the Flight Deck was a brilliant first album. Unfortunately, like the rest of us, they were hit by some tumultuous shitstorms during the next decade (of a personal nature it seems), and never again put forth the kind of crazed near-death clarity they once did. Until now.
“A Season Underground,” which in fact came out in 2011, is now collected together with other new works in a second album called The Machine that Made Us. Now perfectly aged, it is completely at home even with this strange new season of depravity. Honestly, ladies and gentlemen, please, I will thank you for quality over quantity. There’s little stink to be raised with waiting another 13 years for the next album.