The duo started writing their third studio album after contributing music to the 2014 film Dumb and Dumber To.[1] The album was recorded in Hawaii and Los Angeles, and it was co-produced by Empire of the Sun and Peter Mayes alongside regular collaborator Jonathan Sloan.[2] In November 2015, lead singer Luke Steele noted that the album was "75 percent there".[1]
On 22 August 2016, it was announced that the album was titled Two Vines and would be released on 28 October. It features contributions from Fleetwood Mac singer-guitarist Lindsey Buckingham, Wendy Melvoin (from Prince's The Revolution band), and David Bowie collaborators Henry Hey and Tim Lefebvre.[2]Nick Littlemore explained the inspiration behind the title as "this image of a modern city overtaken by jungle".[3]
The album's lead single, "High and Low", was released on 24 August 2016.[2] This was shortly followed by the album's first promotional single, "Two Vines", which was released the following day.[4] "To Her Door" was released on 30 September 2016 as the album's second single.[5]
Two Vines received generally positive reviews from critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalised rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 66, based on 14 reviews.[7]
