Vampire Weekend - Modern Vampires of the City

idk i find the whole "they've moved away from their idiosyncrasies back to tom petty and the national" idea off the mark

American Heartland is a bold exageration, also.

Yeah come on you haven't really paid any attention though have you?

i remember actually reading ALL the lyrics to one of their past albums because what i heard in the single horrified me so much

I mean it's a bit like how Taylor Swift lyrics basically sound like collections of banalities to me (NB I am 100% pro-banalities in pop songs) and I'm really not interested enough in the music to even bother to look for these alleged insightful character studies or whatever.

idk i find the whole "they've moved away from their idiosyncrasies back to tom petty and the national" idea off the mark

It's not really supported by "Diane Young" but as a thesis statement it's a good bit less offensive than "they've stopped playing African music and started playing things that are more comfortable"; I'm reacting less to whether the statement is true or not and more to how badly I want to slap the author for making it.

(oh btw I finally was tricked into hearing "I Knew You Were Trouble" for the first time this weekend thanks to an unfortunate cab ride and it's pretty clearly the best thing Taylor Swift has ever done, benefiting largely from not really sounding like her in the backing music or vocally)

i wouldn't really say character studies are t-swift's thing so much as situation studies. i guess i'd probably talk about pistol annies (and that entire axis of country) as purveyors of the best character studies in pop right now.

Yeah but the Pistol Annies comparison doesn't actually work because I like them.

xp "nostalgic" is such a weird criticism to make

They're a bit like the Flaming Lips or Belle and Sebastian or something in that their aesthetic seems fine or actively enjoyable if you're on board with the music and if you aren't it's a real "god help us if there's a war" kind of reaction.

OTM. Part of VW's attraction to me is how often I hover between being disgusted. But then their lightness is the other part of their attraction.

That's why I find "beige" another odd choice in Lex's critique. They're unapologetically divisive.

Man, they have hooks and hooks and hooks and they tumble out over each other and it's great. That's why I like them. That and the awesome sound and space.

"Their music is locally sourced!"

"PRETENTIOUS ASSHOLES."

Lather rinse repeat.

nah i mean "beige" musically (although aren't most famous people above a certain level inevitably "divisive") - as fussy and intricate as their music is i can't help thinking it should perhaps be more exciting

define "exciting"

this isn't really a new problem with music discussion but it's pretty annoying to have this type of discussion using a woefully inadequate, wholly subjective vocabulary almost guaranteed to keep people from understanding each other

Agreed. I think they're dead exciting.

'eeww critically acclaimed hipsters'

From the NPR interview re the song "Obvious Bicycle":

Batmanglij: This song is interesting because it evolved. It started with a very hectic drum beat that I made, and that inspired me to play piano, and I just played these simple piano chords that came very quickly. I was listening Plastic Ono Band, the John Lennon album a lot, and that might have had some inspiration on me.

It's all John Lennon's fault

i quite like powell's review, but dombal's is good too

they sound like the sea & cake but boring

http://www.buzzfeed.com/perpetua/vampire-weekend-vs-yolo

no

oh come on, you know you want to

THE DARK SIDE OF YOLO

I can't

wow that URL is a quadrumvirate of DNW

Perpetual YOLO

That he had the willpower to resist the use of the phrase 'YOLO Tengo' is one of those minor miracles for which we should all be thankful.

i like "cousins" "a-punk" and "oxford comma" but honestly i just don't like ezra koenig's "teen sting" voice

the new stuff is too post-foster the people productionwise for my taste

http://s3-ec.buzzfed.com/static/enhanced/webdr03/2013/5/12/20/anigif_enhanced-buzz-17891-1368405289-0.gif

also their earworminess is not integral to their environmental qualities; a lot of these songs seem like extremely developed sketches that hint, subtley and successfully i think, at an implied larger drawing

― emo canon in twee major (BradNelson), Monday, May 13, 2013 2:19 PM (6 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This very much OTM.

I can't get with the idea that this is "back to the American Heartland" in sound, at least not unless I missed something and organs and harpsichords now signify that.

The precise point of distinction is that whereas Contra (and Vampire Weekend) were clear and brightly etched and propulsive this is fuzzy and staggering and kind of decrepit at times, the opening sprint versus the final push over the finish line. The strict geographical flavour seems like a second order issue in this regard, but if anything it sounds European, like it's soundtracking a Henry James character travelling round the continent.

And yeah "beige" is wrong - "Ya Hey" is probably the song that Lex will hate more than any other song ever written if he actually hears it, but it's not because it's boring or plays it safe.

idk why people go on about the characters in VW songs Girls as though they're particularly well drawn rather than a bunch of cultural reference points clumsily thrown at the song screen in the hope a couple will stick

I don't actually believe the above but it feels like a matching complaint.

well at least vampire weekend guy is not - to my limited knowledge - as racist as lena dunham, eh

"as racist"

I've been listening to this many times since yesterday and I'm not particularly grabbed so far... except by "step" (and "ya hey" which I love).
but it seems like an album that needs time to open up so we'll see...
I kinda miss the african/caribbean vibes.

xp Their expressed aim was to make a record that sounded "American but not Americana", ie reflecting the mix of immigrant identities that you find in New York, which makes sense for a band which includes recent descendants of Iranians, Italians and Eastern European Jews. Knowing that, I can hear it in the record but "heartland" is way off the mark.

Yeah, I don't hear anything pointing toward "heartland".
it's no "rattle & hum" (and thank Yahve for that !).

xp okay that makes sense - and chimes in with the Manhattan-style clip for 'Step'.

I like the utopian vibe of the anecdote in Fingerback - that in NYC an orthodox Jewish girl can fall for the arab guy at the falafel shop. Ezra says it's a true story, as is hearing someone segue between Israelites and 19th Nervous Breakdown.

19th nervous israelite

I have to say I don't get the "Israelites/19th nervous breakdown" line : do you have an explanation ?

It matters less than Koenig's charming accent.

He said he heard it in a cafe or bar and liked the transition because of how it sounded but also because of the resonance of the titles. They sound quite ominous put together like that.

Yeah there are loads of little melodic and harmonic touches in this that you just don't hear in rock music, especially indie, even when it's ostensibly ambitious and wild and out there. The faux-baroque keyboard lines, the harmonies on 'Hudson', etc.

The organ sound and tumbling percussion on "Everlasting Arms" = *swoon*

immediately getting junior reid stuck in in your head is an insurmountable hurdle to listening to this record properly imo

"Ya Hey" is probably the song that Lex will hate more than any other song ever written if he actually hears it

scrambled to make it stop when the mewing noises came in. what the FUCK

That's my boy

He said he heard it in a cafe or bar and liked the transition because of how it sounded but also because of the resonance of the titles. They sound quite ominous put together like that.

oh ok, I see. thanks !