Let's Eat Grandma - Two Ribbons (2LP + 7") - 45RPM

Let’s Eat Grandma’s third album, Two Ribbons, lands with the bittersweet clarity of a late-night phone call you’ve been putting off. Released on 29 April 2022 via Transgressive, it follows the duo’s breakout I'm All Ears but trades that record’s playful sprawl for something leaner and heavier with feeling. The backstory is well known by now. Rosa Walton and Jenny Hollingworth, best friends since childhood in Norwich, drifted apart during a stretch of growing up, grief, and changing lives, then found their way back through these songs. You can hear the distance closing track by track.

The singles drew a bright map of the record’s range. “Hall of Mirrors” walks into a club and finds its heart pounding along with the synths. It is a shimmering pop song that still carries a nervous flutter, made sharper by El Hardwick’s prismatic video. “Happy New Year” does what its title promises. Fireworks, shared memories, the renewed vow to show up for each other, all wrapped in a melody that begs for a singalong. “Levitation” takes off on a propulsive groove and doesn’t look back. Then the title track, “Two Ribbons,” pulls the lights down to a single acoustic glow. Hollingworth sings with almost documentary focus, naming grief and friendship in plain language, and it hits harder than any oversize arrangement could.

The shift in writing approach matters. In interviews around the album, they talked about working more separately than before, then stitching their pieces together so the record reads like overlapping diaries. That perspective gives Two Ribbons its unusual pacing. It moves from rushes of synth-pop to intimate confession without whiplash. David Wrench, a longtime collaborator, co-produced and mixed the album with a steady hand, letting the drums punch and the basslines spring, but always keeping the voices close. You can feel the air around the vocals. It sounds human.

What I love here is the tangible sense of place and time. The record captures that late 2010s to early 2020s pop-tech churn, but it refuses to flatten emotion into a filter. “Happy New Year” glints with little arpeggios that feel like sparklers. “Hall of Mirrors” keeps finding new angles to its hook, the way pop crushes mutate and return in your head. Then the closer strips away the synthetic sheen and leaves you with breath, guitar, and a story. It is a brave sequencing choice that pays off.

Two Ribbons also sits in an interesting moment for their wider orbit. Rosa Walton’s solo track “I Really Want to Stay at Your House” had its own second life through Cyberpunk 2077 and the Edgerunners surge, which threw a fresh spotlight on her voice. Coming back to this album, you can hear how that pop instinct is balanced by Hollingworth’s grounded writing, shaped by loss and reflection after the death of her partner Billy Clayton in 2019. The balance is the point. It is the sound of a friendship finding a new shape.

Critics heard it too. The album drew strong reviews from places like The Guardian and NME, who noted both the sharpened songwriting and the emotional directness. Fans rallied around the singles, but this is a record that deepens if you sit with the album front to back. The glow of the early tracks makes the final songs feel earned, not abrupt. It is the rare pop-adjacent album that holds tension without forcing it.

On vinyl, that arc really breathes. The low end on “Levitation” comes alive, and the space around the title track gives you that room-silence that digital sometimes rushes past. If you are searching for Let’s Eat Grandma vinyl, this one is a must. Two Ribbons vinyl pressings were handled with care, and it is the kind of album that rewards turning the lights low and letting a side play through. If you like to buy Let’s Eat Grandma records online, or you are browsing a Melbourne record store on a Saturday afternoon, file it near Robyn and HAIM but be ready for something more candid. It also pairs neatly with their earlier work if you are building out your Let’s Eat Grandma albums on vinyl.

Two Ribbons is not a reinvention for reinvention’s sake. It is a refocusing, a decision to let melody and memory do the heavy lifting. The hooks still sparkle, but the album lingers because it feels lived in. Put it on, sit with it, then let it sit with you. If you came here hunting for vinyl records Australia recommendations, consider this your nudge. This is one to own, to play, and to keep close.