Black Swan is the fourth and final studio album by English rock band Athlete, released on 24 August 2009 through Fiction Records.

Black Swan received mixed reviews from music critics, some saying that it was a worthy follow-up to its predecessor, while others felt it lacked lyrical substance and unfavourably compared it to Coldplay.

[3] The band left Parlophone in early 2008 as the label's parent company EMI was being taken over, and as a result, the team behind them was made redundant.

[5] Bassist Carey Willetts said the band's financial situation was in jeopardy, as on a few occasions they could "only afford to pay our mortgages for another month".

[8][9][10] Pott said the title came from the book The Black Swan (2007) by Nassim Nicholas Taleb: "He was saying that our lives are made up of a handful of significant shocks, good or bad".

[4][14] He wrote "Don't Hold Your Breath", which had guitar parts in vein of "Yellow" (2000) by Coldplay, after his wife had nearly suffered a miscarriage while he was away on tour in Florida.

[4][16] The Coldplay-esque "The Awkward Goodbye" and U2-indebted "Magical Mistakes" are followed by the album's closing track "Rubik's Cube", which recalls the stripped-down sound of Beyond the Neighbourhood.

[19] The song was released as the lead single from the album on 17 August 2009; the CD version included "Long Way to Run", while the 7-inch vinyl record had "Ghosts from the Past" as its B-side.

[4][7] A two-disc edition included "Lucky as Hell", "Animation", "Wild Wolves", "Sky Diver", "Ordinary Angel", an acoustic version of "Black Swan Song" and "Needle on a Record".

[28] The 10-inch vinyl edition included the radio mix and an alternative version of "The Getaway", "Somewhere Beneath My Skin", "Corner of My Baby's Eyes" and "With You I Never Loose".

[42] Gigwise writer Jamie Milton noted that while the band kept to their "knack of delivering a sumptuous blend of guitar-driven pop and emotional balladry", the tracks "have no real meaning".

[17] The Guardian editor Will Dean shared a similar sentiment, stating that the lyrics "talk a lot without actually saying anything" and the music is "so all-encompassing that any charm is suffocated".

[13] Lauren Murphy of The Irish Times wrote that the majority of the tracks "are seriously in need of asteroid injection", while Slant Magazine's Jonathan Keefe said it "adheres to a predictable formula and familiar emotional terrain".

[9][38] BBC Music reviewer Chris Jones said that while it "oozes with emotion, [and] with earnestness", it also had an "uncanny knack for the grand, empty gesture".

[14] Now writer Paul Terefenko said the "closest this popportunistic foursome comes to satisfying songsmithery is The Getaway, whose title is sound advice for potential buyers of this album".

[9] Paste writer Justin Jacobs added to this, saying the band "joins the ranks of Coldplay clones [...] in a land of make-believe where every chorus is huge, every guitar plays only quarter notes and every song is about overcoming an unexplained hardship".