Vampire Weekend - Father of the Bride

I liked 'Modern Vampires' a lot as well but I feel like another indie pop record with multicoloured synths and huge clattery drums is the last thing the world needs right now.

re: madchester and "you can't always get what you want" i definitely thought of "movin' on up" on first listen

"harmony hall" feels exactly where they should be at this point in their career - a little more relaxed & not as frantic or with as much of the tightly wound baroque flourishes, a good way to mature

Yeah MVOTC lacked the baroque keyboards/strings as well as the afro guitar licks and a general lightness.
It's good if they go back to these key aspects of their sound.

MVOTC still had some of the baroque aspect ("step" and "don't lie" especially, which were some of the stronger tracks) but lacked that general lightness from the afro guitar etc. and i think that contrast was fairly key to the first two albums. "harmony hall" is a return to that lightness but not quite to the same degree which is what i like about it

yes, I totally agree.

All I can think about is how Brad Paisley married the actress from Father of the Bride and then wrote a song about how he married the actress from Father of the Bride and titled it Back to the Future.

Liking "Harmony Hall" a lot. It hits enough positive touchstones for me ("Movin' on Up" was the one that immediately came to mind) and combines them in an interesting and catchy enough way to stand apart. I also didn't notice the "Finger Back" quote until reading it here, but that's not one of my favorite songs on MVOTC. "2021" doesn't do much for me, but seems like a song that may have more purpose for the flow of an album

k nvm i love both of these. excited for the rest of the album!!!

2021 sounds kinda 1975

Feels like a slight move back towards the bubbly synthetic touches of Contra. Is it me or has his voice/singing changed (seems a bit more generic somehow)?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QkPWqnTWj38

Wow he still looks so juvenile. I could say he’s like 22 or something !
Will watch the whole intw later, thanks for posting it.
As for his singing/voice on HH, I find it’s the same as it was. Same inflexions and even melodic touches.
But the generic/MOR impression might come from the melodies that I find a bit lazy (hence my initial comparison with a 90s romcom opening song !).

what happened to his hair and sartorial sense :(

The intro and verses are very nice (both melody and guitar licks). The chorus and instrumental chorus are feel good enough and by the final it’s groovy/fun. The piano and guitar solos are great. The prechorus is the part I don’t enjoy much.

I think it’s just his « radio » look !

his hair looks the same

he once believed in gel

He probably knew he'd be wearing headphones that day, and planned accordingly.

He's 34 years old and has a brand new baby. He's probably past the hair gel and boat shoes? (Also, who cares?)

I actually think he wears his pyjamas in that radio intw !
Especially as they say it's very early in the morning...

(Also, who cares?)

ahem

To stay on sartorial issues : the baggy flashy sweatpants here are a strange combination with the with shirt/overcoat...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDLZ90Oc8FY

Harmony Hall is gorgeous and amazing and it should/will have a place on every Wes Anderson-core film soundtrack till the end of time

listened to the singles from the s/t last night and goddamn what a perfect group of songs. I still get such a thrill from A-Punk.

Long version !
https://youtu.be/qa1t5bjJbms

I still haven't heard the new songs - will probably just absorb the LP as a whole when it comes out.

They plan to release 2 songs/month until April apparently.
So it’s like getting an LP first then a regular album.

just got tickets for philly!!!!! :D::D:D:D:D:D:D

Just came here to say that "Harmony Hall" is a fucking jam. The second new song I enjoy while it's playing, but can't remember how it goes when it's off... it's just kinda forgettable. Got tickets for Red Rocks on the last date of their fall tour. Hope the next couple songs draw out more of the relaxed, Grateful Dead-esque vibe from "Harmony Hall."

A friend just surprised me w/tix for the Houston date!

i am jazzed for this record

Maybe just me but every time I hear the chorus of Harmony Hall I think it's Jeff Tweedy.

It's you.

ready for 2 more songs

Are they good live?

Saw them at Barclays in fall 2013 and they were fucking great. Obviously can't speak for the new lineup but I really loved that show - can't beat this setlist:

Cousins
White Sky
Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa
Diane Young
Unbelievers
Holiday
Step
Horchata
Everlasting Arms
Finger Back
California English
A-Punk
Boston (Ladies of Cambridge)
Ya Hey
Don't Lie
Song 2 (Blur cover)
Campus
Oxford Comma
Giving Up the Gun
Obvious Bicycle
---
Hannah Hunt
One (Blake's Got a New Face)
Walcott

so they played all their songs lol

haha almost! no problem for me, they don't have a bad song imo. would've loved to have heard Bryn tho but I can't complain.

Sky Ferreira and Solange opened. I got there for SF and there were maybe 300 people in the whole arena. this was a month before Night Time, My Time came out. she was great, I saw her perform again two months later to a rapturous sold out 9:30 Club. Barclays crowd was still kinda thin during Solange but VW packed it, pretty sure they sold it out.

Saw them in 2008, 2011, 2012, each time fantastic, even in 2008 when I was scowling at the idea of "Vampire Weekend" seconds before they went on stage.

I love that they’ve kept the same stupid name this whole time

Each time I listen to "Harmony Hall" I like it about twice as much as I did before, and I've listened to it 5 times so I'm really high on it right now

I haven't caught up with the thread yet, but I just heard the single for the first time and I'm assuming I'm not the first to comment that it sounds like Paul Simon fronting Happy Mondays. And yet it works! (Or, alternatively, of course it works.)

yeah this is one hell of a grower

yeah, it's similar to "step" in that way for me, which i was mystified by when i first heard it (souls of mischief?), but it eventually fell into place.

I mean, a lot of people are saying "this song sounds great despite recalling the corny piano work of Movin' On Up and Bittersweet Symphony and etc." but I still unironically love that stuff so this is pretty much hitting the spot for me

Bittersweet Symphony has pianos?

oh maybe not but it does that same kinda thing with the chords rising and falling, i'm not a music theorist maaaaaaaaan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlkTVMMkCP4

Ezra's pancakes look delicious.

The lyrics seem a bit nothingy by Koenig standards, and the recycling of the "I don't want to live like this..." line is distracting. But musically it sounds pretty nice. B+

Yeah they were sort of open about the Jerry Garcia influence on this album and even played a lick from china cat sunflower on their cover of Post Malone’s sunflower - and they also played bits of their own song “sunflower” in it.

Iirc some Vampire Weekend members even played with The Grateful Dead in a concert tribute to Jerry Garcia.

Yeah, and I remember reading an interview with Ezra where he said this album was musically inspired specifically by the Jerry Garcia Band rather than the Grateful Dead. This makes total sense after hearing "Rubin and Cherise"

Whoa, so I was actually right! I thought maybe this was one of those things where it sounded identical to me but it was some idiosyncratic thing about my ear/brain.

Yep

“Father of the Bride” isn’t total dad-rock; it’s got weird beats and processed synth sounds and samples of tracks by Hans Zimmer and the Japanese electronic musician Haruomi Hosono — evidence of the “adaptability” that led promoter Craig Nyman to book Vampire Weekend as one of the few rock acts (alongside Post Malone and Billie Eilish) at September’s Life Is Beautiful festival in Las Vegas.

But pay close attention to “Stranger” — especially the little instrumental section after the second verse — and you’ll catch an undeniable whiff of the Jerry Garcia Band.

“And I’m talking JGB, not the Dead,” Koenig said. “That’s an important distinction.”

https://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/music/ct-ent-vampire-weekend-feature-0507-story.html

Gotta assume that's influence from his Time Crisis co-host (who has a Grateful Dead tribute band)

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/grateful-dead-phish-vampire-weekend-members-on-jerry-garcia-tribute-177078/

It was the drummer Chris Tomson in 2012.