Two Suns is the Mercury Music Prize nominated second album by English-Pakistani solo artist Bat for Lashes (pseudonym of Natasha Khan), released on 6 April 2009. It is the follow-up to the also Mercury Music Prize nominated album Fur and Gold.

According to the press release, Two Suns is "a record of modern-day fables exploring dualities on a number of levels – two lovers, two planets, two sides of a personality," bringing reflection about "the philosophy of the self and duality, examining the need for both chaos and balance, for both love and pain, in addition to touching on metaphysical ideas concerning the connections between all existence."

In Two Suns, Khan also presents an alter ego named Pearl, described by the press release as "a destructive, self-absorbed, blonde, femme fatale of a persona who acts as a direct foil to Khan's more mystical, desert-born spiritual self."

The first single from the album, released on 1 March 2009, is "Daniel". Two Suns was recorded in segments in California, New York, London, Brighton and Wales.

It was co-produced by Khan and Dave Kosten, her collaborator on Fur and Gold, and features collaborations with members of Yeasayer on various tracks and Scott Walker on the final track.

The whole album was available for listening at the Last.fm website.

Reception

Two Suns received generally favorable reviews. The album holds a score of 76 out of 100 on the review aggregator website Metacritic.http Two Suns was placed on Slant Magazine's list of best albums of the 2000s at number 97.

Release history

Chart performance

Certifications

References

Category:2009 albums

Category:Bat for Lashes albums

Category:Parlophone albums

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Artist/Band Information

Natasha Khan (born 25 October 1979), also known by her stage name "Bat for Lashes", is an English musician. As a musician she sings and plays the piano, guitar, harpsichord and the autoharp.

Khan's debut album Fur and Gold, released on 11 September 2006, peaked at #48 on the UK Album Charts and went on to be nominated for the Mercury Prize in 2007, in the following year Khan also picked up two BRIT nominations for Best Breakthrough Artist and Best Female, leading to growing media attention.

Khan’s second album Two Suns, released on the 6 April 2009, reached #5 on the UK Album Charts and #17 on the Irish Album Charts. The first single released from the second album "Daniel" charted within the top 40. The second single "Pearl's Dream" was released on 22 June 2009. The album Two Suns has also been nominated for the Mercury Prize. Khan herself was up for Best Female Solo Artist at 2010's Brit Awards.

History

Early life

Khan was born in London on 25 October 1979. Until the age of five she was raised in Wembley where her parents had met and married several years before. However her father, Rehmat Khan, a former professional squash player, decided to relocate the family to the commuter town of Rickmansworth in Hertfordshire to help with his coaching of future squash world open winner Jahangir Khan, Natasha's uncle.

As children Khan, along with her sister Suraya and brother Tariq would attend her Uncle’s squash matches, in an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Khan reflected that seeing her Uncle helped inspire her. "The roar of the crowd is intense; it is ceremonial, ritualistic, I feel like the banner got passed to me but I carried it on in a creative way. It is a similar thing, the need to thrive on heightened communal experience."

With her father’s abandonment of the family Khan turned to the piano. Deciding to play improvised pieces instead of attending lessons Khan herself felt the piano became an outlet for her emotions. “You need to find a channel to express things, to get them out", she said.

During her teens Khan was also a victim of racism. Speaking about her time in after-school clubs she claimed “the kids there totally ripped me to shreds.” This rejection led Khan to rebel, making the decision to “bunk off” school and stay at home listening to music. “My mum would take me to the train station and I pretended to get the train; she'd drive to work and I would go home and play a tape of Nirvana all day”.

With the completion of her GCSEs and A-Levels she decided to embark on a road trip through America with her boyfriend at the time, using the money earned from her part time job at a local card-making factory. After spending three months touring through the US and Mexico Khan returned to Britain and settled down in Brighton to study a degree in music and visual arts at the University of Brighton.Khan is 5 "8 (172 cm) tall.

Fur and Gold

Natasha Khan by David Shankbone.jpgthumbleftKhan playing New York City's Bowery Ballroom in support of Fur and Gold.

Khan graduated in music and visual arts;, arbobo.fr, 11 June 2007. while at university her experimental work was influenced by artists such as Steve Reich and Susan Hiller, and she produced multi-media work centred on sound installations, animations and performance. She went on to work as a nursery school teacher, and it was during this period that she began writing the material for her first album. "Whenever I'm writing music it's a very visual place in my mind," she said. "It has a location full of characters and colours and landscapes, so those two things really complement each other, and they help the other one to blossom and support the other. They are like brother and sister."

Khan's debut single, "The Wizard", was released digitally through Drowned in Sound records and on seven-inch vinyl through Khan's own imprint, She Bear Records. She then signed to the record label Echo, alongside Feeder and former Moloko singer Róisín Murphy, and released her debut album, Fur and Gold, on 11 September 2006. In 2007, Bat for Lashes parted company with Echo and signed to Parlophone records. Fur and Gold was re-released with the addition of bonus material. A limited vinyl version was released by Los Angeles indie label, Manimal Vinyl in May 2007.

Khan's music has been likened to the work of Siouxsie Sioux, The Observer, Garry Mulholland, Sunday 13 August 2006. Excerpt: "Khan and producer David Kosten reinvent Siouxsie/Bush/Bjork mystical sex, musical travelogue and poetic dreamstate for the contemporary singer-songwriter milieu" Björk, Kate Bush, Cat Power, PJ Harvey, Annie Lennox, Tori Amos and Fiona Apple., Bat for Lashes' biography by MacKenzie Wilson. Excerpt: "Echoes of Björk and Siouxsie Sioux are heard throughout Bat for Lashes' mystical indie rock sound."

On 17 July, Fur and Gold was announced as one of the albums nominated for the 2007 Mercury Prize, losing out to Klaxons' Myths of the Near Future despite being a favourite of British media to win the award. BBC NEWS