Vampire Weekend; Arctic Monkeys of 2008?

i like tha fact that they don't try to impress the listener.
or at least thats what i feel.
as oppose to many of the recent years "hype" bands.

backlash isn't against bands, it's against hype

(most of the time)

If bands are "important" to the degree that people pay attention, then Vampire Weekend are important, at least for the moment. MSM is obsessed with the internet, and music blogs are obsessed with first-posting the indie-pop flavor of the week. That makes this kind of flashmob pigpile unsurprising, especially if the band is actually likely to sell. It's not hype; it's simultaneous head-turning.

Anyway, I don't think this band even exists. Vampire Weekend are taking place entirely withing SFJ's head, as he settles some sort of bet with himself.

My first exposure to this band was their appearance on Letterman.
I flipped it on about a minute after it had started. I guessed that it was Vampire Weekend and waited around til the end of their performance to see if I was right. Dave seemed to like them a lot, I wasn't really impressed.

Dave has impeccable taste. Their Letterman performance wasn't the best.

There was actually some moment in the mid-90s where I realized that while TV sound is always bad, Letterman's is somehow even worse; you'd think VW would be would be pretty easy to handle, sound-wise, but the bass seemed to get lost on this one. TV exposes their youngness and newness, too -- they're not the kind of band that's going to come across very commanding.

I kind of feel bad for bands, hinging promotional efforts on TV appearances -- it's a pretty awkward format for making first impressions!

yeah, everyone sounds shitty on Letterman

Sound was definitely thin. I was pleased that I correctly guessed who it was after only reading about them, though.

#22 on the UK charts NOT BAD

Christgau on Shepherd on Vampire Weekend.

Aaaaand... go.

haha

Summarized thusly: "If you're going to pick on VW (a) know your referents; (b) don't question their socio-political motivations."

oh no! being read by xgau! oh no!

I was about to say I promise to stop harping on VW as shitty afropop as that's obviously not what they're going for/people are getting out of it, but then xgau had to go and remind us the band calls their sound "Upper West Side Soweto" so nuts to that.

if people are digging VW as a brighter Shins or Nu-Hoboken or whatever, swellsville, but obv the band hasn't picked up on that.

Anthony you have no idea of the struggles we face every day in Morningside Heights, me and Vampire Weekend and Nellie McKay

No but seriously, here is one spot where we can agree completely: it would definitely not behoove this band to start thinking that Africa is their selling point, or that they need to approach African music more, or more authentically.

it would definitely not behoove this band to start thinking that Africa is their selling point

but don't they already?!

it's probably what keeps their phish-head drummer around, you know.

it would definitely not behoove this band to start thinking that Africa is their selling point

I dunno. Wouldn't hurt to update the image a little.

http://i274.photobucket.com/albums/jj242/donaldparsley/Scat.jpg

Where is cover of Bwana Zoulou LP when you need it?

'selling point'

so i'm hearing this album in full for the first time, and yeah, afropop isn't what comes to mind. The French Kicks come to mind.

it's really a shame that the news angle annoyed me so, as I might have missed out on the best French Kicks album yet.

though "cape cod kwassa kwassa" still sucks hairy ass. god, i really DO hope they don't move further from post-feelies into post-sting.

as much as musically the band really just indulges in a little nonspecific afro-tropical whimsy here and there around the standard NYC sound (I actually feel kinda conned after the singles/articles!), I'm actually curious if fans actually LIKE the lispy patois the singer affects on those numbers. Isn't it kind of grating-to-offensive? or do people think he pulls it off English Beat/Rancid style?

obv you're free to feel Dave Wakeling and Tim Armstrong don't really pull it off either

I'd trouble distinguishing Wakeling from Ranking Roger at first, so I'm no judge.

and actually I might prefer that french kicks album called trial of the century or something, the one with the skin on the cover.

if people are digging VW as a brighter Shins or Nu-Hoboken or whatever, swellsville, but obv the band hasn't picked up on that.

-- da croupier, Monday, 4 February 2008 22:42 (2 days ago) Link

Say what you will about The Shins, they have tunes and a strong singer. I don't think we can say as much about Vampire Weekend thus far, so I'm not seeing big things for them.

If Mowgli ever formed a band with his jungle friends, they would sound like Vampire Weekend...just imagine Baloo puffing on panpipes....throwing in a bunch of chattering 'eh-eh-eh-ehs' that would ricochet coconuts off trees faster than Keef..."

From today's NME. Lorks, that's awful.

Good grief.

But anyway, what I wanted to say, besides "OMG @ THIS THREAD" and the various other insane and lengthy discussions about this band and their socio-political status (who says Americans don't care about class as much as the British?) that I've seen, is that...

People talk about them, quite frequently, as "lacking passion" or "bile" or "hunger" or whatever, my inference from this being that Vampire Weekend don't "care" about what they're doing (in the eyes of the person who conceives them as being lacking passion). Clearly I don't think this at all, or I wouldn't be posting. But the reason I don't think this is the case at all is the level of attention to detail and sound and arrangement that is apparent on the album - to me this smacks way more of "giving a fuck" than... who was the last new band with guitars who got praised for giving a fuck? It's the same thing that I got from Guillemots - these people really care what their music sounds like, they really want people to enjoy it, for it to be fun and interesting and positive and beautiful. So sure, with Guillemots there's a Brazilian influence at times (the guitarist's Brazilian), but not enough to bitch about them stealing Sao Paulo's soul in a callous and calculated business plan (I know a little about Brazilian music but really not much at all). I know next to nothing about African music be it pop or anything else - I've got a couple of Fela albums, the best of Ethiopiques, and bugger all else - and I've heard Graceland, outside of that song about being called Al, all of once straight through, and it wouldn't strike me without this brouhaha that VW were stealing or mocking African music anymore than that they were stealing or mocking The Specials or Ski Sunday. This is just pop music. It sounds like some other bits of pop music like all pop music ever has. If the words piss you off a little then pay attention to the drums or the guitars or keys or strings because they're ace (it strikes me that Rostam Batmanglij is WAY more important to what I'm getting out of this band than Ezra Koenig is). If the words piss you off a LOT, listen to Mogwai.

I'm just flabbergasted by the reaction this is getting on here and around the internet. It's a decent little pop record put together beautifully! Everyone I've played it to who isn't a music journalist or internet hardman critic has really enjoyed it.

It's a lovely record, and I'm killing it on repeat. There's a touch too much overthinking going on here - odd, really, since many people's problem with the band is the perception that they're on the clever-clever side.

Based on a couple visits to their myspace, inspired by talk here, I don't like the drumming, and the rest is not interesting enough to compensate.

Everyone I've played it to who isn't a music journalist or internet hardman critic has really enjoyed it.

My two co-workers (neither is a critic) who've played it at work after downloading it out of curiosity basically had the reaction of "eh, whatever," not getting what the big deal is either way.

(my girlfriend likes 'em, though)

debuted at #17 in da US !

on what charts???

billboard albums...

somehow I'm not finding that on billboard

Funny thing is real vampires prefer "Hot Girls in Love."

http://idolator.com/353345/alicia-keys-yep-shes-still-on-top-of-the-album-charts

ah ok next week's chart apparently

http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1581036/20080206/vampire_weekend.jhtml

(head slowly explodes)

there you go

so who's gonna tell us the first week/highest chart positions for the Arctic Monkeys, Feelies, CYHSY, french kicks, etc etc?

the second AM album debuted in the top ten, and the Feelies never charted. Beyond that, gabbs, run it past your pollsters.

I have CYHSY - Some Loud Thunder at 47

obviously their debut didn't chart because CYHSY was still in the process of inventing the internet

comparing vampire weekend, both musically and any other way, to the arctic monkeys is beyond irrelevant