''Beautiful Sharks'' is the second studio album by Australian band

Something for Kate Something for Kate are an Australian alternative rock band, which formed in 1994 with Paul Dempsey on lead vocals and guitar, and Clint Hyndman on drums. They were joined in 1998 by Stephanie Ashworth on bass guitar and backing vocals. The gr ...

, released in June 1999. It marked a change in musical direction for the band, employing interesting and unconventional chord progressions and production. Sounding more sparse and open than their intense debut effort, the album produced four singles: "Electricity", "Whatever You Want", "The Astronaut" and "Hallways". It also had a limited edition release as a two-CD package, with multimedia content on the second disc. At the

ARIA Music Awards of 2001 The 15th Annual Australian Recording Industry Association Music Awards (generally known as ARIA Music Awards) were held on 30 October 2001 at the Capitol Theatre. Rock band Powderfinger won the most awards with six from eight nominations. Le ...

, the album was nominated for Best Adult Alternative Album.ARIA Awards Best Adult Alternative Album winners
/ref> It was the first album recorded with bass player

Stephanie Ashworth Stephanie Ashworth is an Australian bassist, photographer, artist and columnist, known for being a member with the bands Sandpit and Something for Kate, where she performs with her spouse and frontman, Paul Dempsey. Music career Early in Ashwor ...

, although some b-sides released at the time were from recording sessions with Toby Ralph on bass. Explaining the album title, frontman and songwriter

Paul Dempsey Paul Anthony Dempsey (born 25 May 1976) is an Australian musician. He is best known as the lead singer, guitarist and principal lyricist of rock group Something for Kate. Dempsey released his debut solo album, ''Everything Is True'', on 20 Aug ...

said: "I guess the reason I put the two words together it because the shark is an animal that is both beautiful and graceful, but it will turn around and bite you. The theme of the album has a lot to do with humans and the technology we've created and where we're heading. It's beautiful, it's wonderful what we've created for ourselves, but it is going to turn around and bite us." He said the first single, "Electricity", was about energy: "I wish sometimes that I was a pulse of energy … I'm always moving too fast for myself. Nothing's happening quick enough for me, I've always got about 500 things that I want to be doing. That's the thing behind 'Electricity'—I want to anticipate things before they happen. It's about movement and energy and speed, wanting to be a pulse of energy rather than being constrained by physics and flesh and bone."

Track listing

(All songs by Something for Kate except where noted) #"Whatever You Want" – 3.53 #"Hallways" – 3:03 #"Beautiful Sharks" – 3:57 #"Electricity" – 3:50 #"Big Screen Television" – 4:33 #"The Astronaut" – 3:42 #"Easy" – 4:26 #"Slowdance" – 4:35 #"Before Butterfly's Wings" – 4:23 #"Anchorman" – 4:54 #"Back to You" – 3:57 #"Photograph" – 3:38

Deluxe edition bonus disc

The 2014 deluxe edition included a bonus disc of the album's B-sides.

Track listing

#"Sleep is Worth the Wait" - 5:58 #"Pinstripe - Acoustic version" - 5:56 #"Colored Chalk" - 4:10 #"Easy (Mr Barrow & Mr Yates Surfin' for Kate Remix)" - 3:25 #"Mental Note" - 4:39 #"Electricity (Live at the Wireless)" - 3:56 #"Snapshot" - 5:46 #"Back to You - Piano version" - 4:41 #"Belief=Function=Belief" - 4:54 #"Beautiful Sharks - Revisited" - 4:10 #"Born Yesterday" - 4:33 #"

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Warren Cuccurullo Warren Bruce Cuccurullo (born December 8, 1956) is an American musician, singer-songwriter, restaurant owner and former body builder who first worked with Frank Zappa during the 1970s. He was also a founding member of Missing Persons in the 1980s ...

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John Taylor John Taylor, Johnny Taylor or similar may refer to: Academics *John Taylor (Oxford), Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University, 1486–1487 *John Taylor (classical scholar) (1704–1766), English classical scholar *John Taylor (English publisher) (178 ...

) - 6:07 #"Like Bankrobbers (Live at the Wireless)" - 5:09

Charts

Certifications

Personnel

- guitars, vocals *

- bass *Clint Hyndman - drums *Glenn Richards - backing vocals ("Whatever You Want") *Gareth Skinner - strings ("Slowdance")

Release history

References

1999 albums Something for Kate albums Murmur (record label) albums Albums produced by Brian Paulson {{1990s-alt-rock-album-stub