In 1993, Four-Calendar Café was released during a rough time for the Cocteau Twins. The album was their 7th studio album and the second to last album on their discography. The band was on the precipice of disbandment due to internal problems between the band members, notably, the breakup between Elizabeth Fraser and Rob Guthrie that same year. The duo separated after 10 years together and they shared a daughter together.

The future of the band was further threatened by contract issues that had arised from changing labels after their previous original album Heaven or Las Vegas (1990). They had decidedly gone from an independent label to an influential and powerful one. It was under this new label where they made their U.S. stage debut. Their last album Milk and Kisses was released 3 years later in 1996. The band has not reunited since and, according to Simon Raymonde, will never reform again.

Truthfully, the first time I heard the album in full, I thought it sounded like their happiest. Not only did some of the lyrics actually sound articulate, a deviation from the usual preference of abstract sound, but they form stories.

There are many musical motifs in their discography such as the period appropriate use of synths. I would describe theirs as softer and more moody, but some of the synths actually take a break from their usual moodiness and are much brighter in nature and take on the more popular sound of the decade than the shoegaze genre they are mostly attributed with.