We are Beautiful, We Are Doomed

Los Campesinos! - We are Beautiful, We Are Doomed
Critic Score
Based on 24 reviews
2008 Ratings: #33 / 806
User Score
Based on 116 ratings
2008 Rank: #47
Liked by 16 people
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CRITIC REVIEWS

100
Entertainment Weekly

We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed is full of half-heartfelt, half-hilarious songs that capture the rush of being young in a noisy new century.

100
A.V. Club
This new pack is smart, immediate, and anthemic in the way only bedroom-pop fanatics can muster.
90
NME

Cooked up in a session originally meant to spawn a batch of B-sides, ‘We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed’ instead debuts 10 songs that outstrip LC!’s debut album at every turn.

90
Sputnikmusic
It's unresolved, flawed and too self-aware for its own good, but it's also gloriously careless, heartwarming and so much goddamn fun. We're a whole lot of things but Los Campesinos! have it pretty much figured out; we are beautiful, and we are doomed. This album proves it.
90
DIY
'We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed' shows real growth for a band who were singing about Livejournal entries and mixtapes only a year ago. Sure, they've not changed in any dramatic sense, but their lyrics are even more witty, their melodies are even more catchy and their delivery is even more meaningful.
83
Pitchfork
Just eight months after the release of their debut album, Los Campesinos! already return with the follow-up-- a messy, glorious, noisy document of internet café-era indie life that sounds best when sung by heart.
80
NOW Magazine
For Los Campesinos! to come up with such a strong follow-up not even a year after their last is an amazing feat.
80
Uncut
It's every bit as good as their debut.
80
God Is in the TV
They have had time to grow, and there is clear progression shown, it's a step in the right direction.
80
Rolling Stone
On Los Campesinos' second LP, he sings about puking in a Mexican restaurant and fucking up some dude's teeth, but he makes those lyrics sound almost uplifting thanks to a supercharged mix of violins, guitars and glockenspiel.
80
The Skinny
Opener Ways to Make it Through the Wall is an adrenaline-charged rush of pop-hooks masking barbed wit (“I identify my star sign by asking which is least compatible with yours”), while the title track eases off the accelerator to reveal there’s so much more to the appeal of Los Campesinos! than enthused hyperactivity.
80
Prefix

We Are Beautiful might not be the pinnacle for Los Campesinos!, but it does prove they’re rapidly on their way up.

80
Spectrum Culture
Few of their contemporaries can make despondency this fun or funny. Against a how-detached-can-you-get indie landscape, where passion and melody often seem pass unnoticed, their unrestrained vehemence and unmitigated tunefulness is a refreshing treat.
80
SPIN

Seasoned yet no less hyper — there’s still plenty of shouting in unison — the band lays down a more stable foundation for the lyrical zingers of singer-lyricist Gareth Campesinos .

80
AllMusic

Hold on Now, Youngster is still the more magical of the two records, it's the one to play when you want to feel joy, but We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed has more depth and feeling.

80
PopMatters

The band is still firing on all cylinders, even when they downshift into the textured, minor key electronics-and-acoustic guitar lament of “Heart Swells/Pacific Daylight Time” or the instrumental snippet “Between an Erupting Earth and an Exploding Sky” (strangely reminiscent of Mogwai’s “The Sun Smells Too Loud”), and no one can make bitterly self-aware misanthropy sound quite as exciting as this band does.

80
musicOMH
Los Campesinos! continue to compose intelligent, well thought out songs, endearingly so, and eschew any trends other than the one they're setting for themselves.
80
Tiny Mix Tapes

We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed is an immensely enjoyable, plain-sailing cluster of energetic, singable melodies.

79
Paste
At just over a half hour long, it's more EP than album, but even these (ostensible) B-sides make for a giddy and infectious sprint.
70
Drowned in Sound
So while it is more of the same, when that same is such an unpretentious joy to listen to it's churlish to complain. That's not to say it's perfect though: one or two tracks are slightly stretched beyond their natural life.
70
Consequence of Sound
How much longer will Los Campesinos! be able to get away with this? Only time will really tell, but for now, I’m more content with just sitting back, turning up “The End Of The Asterisk”, and letting the good times roll in.
62
Beats Per Minute
There has been essentially no progression between the two records, but in such a short space of time and so early in their career, it would be unfair to expect there to have been much.
60
Alternative Press

The songs explode with more energy than the whole underground combined. This makes it very hard not to love Los Campesinos!, and makes it easier to forgive the fact that this record could have been better served as an EP.

60
Q Magazine
As the exclaimation mark in their name suggests, their every sentiment is exaggerated, but they do do careening anxiety rather well.
StygianHollow
70

Not really that much to say. It's Los Campesinos alright, sounding as welsh as ever

Ways to Make It Through the Wall - 8
Miserabilia - 8.5
We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed - 8
Between an Erupting Earth and an Exploding Sky - 8
You'll Need Those Fingers for Crossing - 8.5
It's Never That Easy Though, Is It? (Song for the Other Hurt) - 8
End of the Asterisk - 8.5
Documented Minor Emotional Breakdown #1 - 8
Heart Swells/Pacific Daylight Time - 8
All Your Kayfabe Friends - 8

Favourite tracks: ... read more

DarkCat
76

(Analbumaday Day 114)

Weirdly fun! Don’t have much time to write a review right now but it’s a pretty interesting album that’s loud and childlike, while still having emo elements. Not my thing but it’s cool.

joshcool
90

Los Campesinos! remain consistent and remain amazing. only a couple of months after Hold On Now, Youngster and it already sounds more mature and already has a different sound structure. this could be a bias bc i am a huge los campesinos fan (literally wearing my Los Campesinos! shirt as i’m writing this review) but this album is almost perfect.

favourite: Ways To Make It Through The Wall, We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed & Heart Swells / Pacific Daylight Time
least favourite: All ... read more

teopochoclero
50

metieron unos casettes de midwest emo a una licuadora y con lo que quedó hicieron el disco, se escucha re sucio.

fiachriamo7
87

like the first album but emo
weirdly it works most of the time

elliottsargent
92

Just a few months after their debut, Los Campesinos! returns with a follow-up LP that does much more than the typical sophomore slump many bands face. In such a short space of time, the group had done a great job at refining their sound as this record has a much darker tone to it. Not that it’s all misery, it is still just as upbeat at times as their debut but the lyrics have managed to mature well while keeping the consistent quirkiness to them as they’re known for.

Fav tracks: ... read more

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