Over the last few years Brisbane indie-dance four piece Toy Balloon have been an integral part of that city’s band scene surrounding the Lofly Hangar DIY venue, and this debut album ‘Toy Division’ represents the fruits of a year-long production collaboration with fellow Lofly Hangar resident Phil Laidlaw (aheadphonehome). From even an initial listen to the nine tracks collected here, it’s obvious what sort of electropop aesthetic Toy Balloon favour, with tracks such as opener ‘You’re Feeling Trapped’ introducing the beatbox drum machine rhythms, swirling analogue synths and jangling New Order-esque guitars (there’s even an explicit lyrical nod to that band to be found on ‘Terrordrome Superclaps’) that remain firmly in place for much of this album.
That said, while the obvious influences are never too far from the surface here, it’s the quality of the songs here such as the dark and brooding ‘Shit Movie’ with its DFA-esque collision of shuffling punk-funk rhythms, jangling guitars and cowbells, and the gliding, shoegazer-meets-triphop indebted crawl of ‘Broken Little Nothing’, featuring dreamy vocal harmonies from McKisko’s Helen Franzmann, that elevates much of ‘Toy Balloon’ above being merely trendy pastiche. It’s a slight pity though that lead singer Greg Cooper goes to such lengths to disguise his vocals with processing on much of this record, with his lyrics being so distorted through vocoder on ‘Balloon Force’ that at points you can’t quite make out just what he’s singing about. While there’s a slight sense that Toy Balloon are still finding their balance at points on ‘Toy Division’, on the whole, this is a fairly strong debut that should go down well with fans of indie-dance along the lines of Hot Chip and Delphic.
Chris Downton
