Wild Beasts is a completely new band for me. After listening to Two Dancers I can safely say that I haven’t missed much. Sometimes I wonder why an album like this that I find thoroughly bland in almost all respects makes it into 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die while some other albums I love have not. To each their own is the best way I can sum it up.
This record is well made and the band members are obviously talented. The atmospherics of this album would fit for certain occasions I suppose. But for me to just sit and listen? This isn’t something I’d recommend to my friends. My rating:
Metacritic gives the album an 83 out of 100.1
Drowned In Sound loved Two Dancers.
Two Dancers, then, doesn't so much follow up their debut as announce Wild Beasts as one of our genuinely special bands, one that can compete - in terms of both musical and lyrical ingenuity as well as sheer pop nous - with any US act you've seen talked up in the music press this year.2
NME said:
Of all the second albums expected this year, this might not have been the one you were waiting for. You might even have hated their first. But Wild Beasts have undergone a sea change, and this beautiful album is a treasure that deserves plundering.3
In 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, Chris Bryans wrote:
You think you have heard it all, and then…Unlike many next-best-things, there is a singularity about Wild Beasts that, barring major changes in direction, is likely to keep the band from mainstream success. No matter: you want to keep a discovery this good all to yourself.4
Enjoy and listen without prejudice. Cheers!
Prime playlist: 152. Two Dancers by Wild Beasts
Full video playlist: You're Welcome 152; Two Dancers by Wild Beasts
Charts
• Peak on Billboard 200 album chart: n/a
• Singles on Billboard Hot 100 chart: n/a
• RIAA certification: n/a
Released on August 3, 2009. Here’s what else was happening:
Pop Culture
• Number one song: “I Gotta Feeling” by The Black Eyed Peas5
• Number one album: Leave This Town by Daughtry6
• Number one movie: Funny People by Judd Apatow7
• Most watched TV programs: American Idol, Sunday Night Football, Undercover Boss, The Big Bang Theory, Grey’s Anatomy, Lost, House, Desperate Housewives, Two and a Half Men, The Office.8
• NYT bestseller, fiction: Best Friends Forever by Jennifer Weiner9
• NYT bestseller, non-fiction: Unmasked by Ian Halperin10
Other albums released that month
• No One's First, and You're Next by Modest Mouse
• Twang by George Strait
• This Time by Robert Cray
• Humbug by Arctic Monkeys
• Keep On Loving You by Reba McEntire
• Ursa Major by Third Eye Blind
• Breakthrough by Colbie Caillat
• Collective Soul (Rabbit) by Collective Soul
• Aim and Ignite by fun.
• The Time of Our Lives by Miley Cyrus
• Pitbull Starring in Rebelution by Pitbull
• I Look to You by Whitney Houston
• Before the Frost...Until the Freeze by The Black Crowes11
Sport
• Aug 2 British Open Women's Golf, Catriona Matthew wins her lone major title.
• Aug 2 Michael Phelps ends the World Swimming Championships in Rome with his 5th gold medal as part of the US 4x100m medley relay team that recorded the 43rd world record of the controversial meet.
• Aug 16 PGA Championship Men's Golf, Yang Yong-eun of South Korea wins his first major title.
• Aug 16 Usain Bolt of Jamaica edges American Tyson Gay to win 100m in world record 9.58s at the World Athletics Championships in Berlin. 12
Notable Births
• TBD
Historical Events
• Aug 3 Bolivia becomes the first country in the history of South America to declare the right of indigenous people to govern themselves.
• Aug 4 Kim Jong-il meets former president Bill Clinton. He pardons and releases captured American journalists Euna Lee and Laura Ling who were found guilty of entering the country illegally in what was actually a hostage taking.13
• Aug 5 Fourteen people are shot at a women's dance class in LA Fitness gymnasium in Collier Township, Pennsylvania. Three women die, as does the gunman.14
• Aug 6 Sonia Sotomayor is confirmed by the United States Senate as Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, replacing David Souter.15
Notable Deaths
• Aug 1 Corazon Aquino, 11th President of the Philippines (1986-92), dies of colon cancer at 76.
• Aug 3 Charles Gwathmey, American architect (Guggenheim Museum addition) and one of "The New York Five", dies of esophageal cancer at 71.
• Aug 5 Budd Schulberg, American screenwriter and novelist (On the Waterfront), dies at 95.
• Aug 6 John Hughes, American film director (Breakfast Club; Ferris Bueller's Day Off), dies of a heart attack at 59.
• Aug 11 Eunice Kennedy Shriver, American founder of the Special Olympics, sister of President John F. Kennedy, dies at 88.
• Aug 12 Les Paul [Polsfuss], American guitarist, (How High The Moon), songwriter and inventor (solid-body electric guitar), dies at 94.16
Bryans, Chris, 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, Fifth printing, ed. by Robert Dimmery p. 931.
Ibid