In late 1998 the band travelled to Toronto to rehearse and record their second album, "Beautiful Sharks", again with Paulson as producer. Ashworth and Dempsey co-wrote half of the music for the album. It was released the following June, which reached No. 10 on the ARIA Albums Chart, and was certified gold status by ARIA for shipment of 35,000 copies, in 2001. According to Australian musicologist, Ian McFarlane, "the acclaimed moved beyond the stark instrumentation of the first album into more diverse pastures (for example, the rumbling 'Electricity', the atmospheric 'Beautiful Sharks')". Dino Scatena, an Australian journalist, opined that "a lot of the beauty in [the album lies in its understated quality ... so subtle, so perfect, any other songwriter would give his little pinky for a moment of such inspiration, such craftsmanship."