Vampire Weekend; Arctic Monkeys of 2008?

I think they're cute in that picture, I wonder what that says about me...

Curiosity got the better of me and I went to their show at ULU last night. They seemed like pleasant boys, shirts tucked in and everything.

Shame about the fire alarm + evacuation mid-way through their set.

damon did it !

Le Weekend Vampire
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osCK6rs2RNA&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSa23oJy78U&NR=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1Qgdt9tTlk

Dirty Projectors review on Dusted by VW singer from 2003...

http://www.dustedmagazine.com/reviews/1012

wait, isn't that the same VW singer that also played in the Dirty Projectors touring band?

So I got the single...

See, it's a 'pack' where you get the CD single and the 7" single for £3.99

So, it's one for the price of two: Same 2 tracks on both, the admittedly fine a-side, and a badly recorded 'demo' version of some lesser track.

B-b-but the album pretty much WAS their "demos" -- they have pre-demos somewhere? I thought the single b-side was "Ladies of Cambridge," which is from the same sessions as everything else.

Xgau:

Young twentysomethings who write about what they know -- college. Liberal arts majors broad-minded enough to worry that "ion displacement won't work in the basement," they took their Columbia studies seriously, which is my idea of how to exploit privilege (though how much privilege is less self-evident than Ivy-hatas assume). Hence all the flags about appropriated exotica, class distinctions and cultural capital -- and the not unrelated correct accents, designer brands and vacation retreats. Their chief thematic concern is whether there's life after graduation, and rather than Afropop, from which they misprise a guitar sound but nothing of the groove it was conceived to serve, their music, as with most fresh recent bands good and bad, is quite Euro. Affecting a clarity and delight that pleases the many and confounds the some, their lyrically alluring, structurally hop-skip-and-jumping songs aren't deep. They're just thoughtful fun. And now let me give it up to an I Love Music post by Pitchfork's Scott Plagenhoef: "off- kilter, upbeat guitar pop, with -- in comparison to their peers -- something singular about both their music (e.g. not just the touches of African pop but the willingness to use space and let the songs breathe a bit) and their lyrics (detail-heavy, expressive; too bad they're images of wealth instead of poverty, otherwise they'd be critical manna)." Right on, my brother.

Grade: A MINUS

that line came to me even later - it's even better than the fireflies one

they have pre-demos somewhere?

there's this - http://www.daytrotter.com/article/1041/free-songs-vampire-weekend

I wouldn't say its their clarity and delight that confounds me.

Its possible that if I hear "A-Punk" 30 more times (which Fuse, record stores, coffeeshops, etc seem dead set on making happen) I might like it as much as the 5th best track on Outlandos D'amour ("Truth Hits Everybody"?).
If I could get past the vocals and into their witty lyrics maybe the songs would resonate stronger. I appreciate the Tim Pope-ness of the video.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfgate/detail?blogid=7&entry_id=24636

SNL next weekend

Breakup end of month, solo album from lead singer in May, Behind the Music special in June, acoustic roots reunion album in September...

hahahahaha

Breakup end of month, solo album from lead singer in May, Behind the Music special in June, acoustic roots reunion album in September...

http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2008/01/vampire_weekend_backlash.html

I'm ahead of being behind my time.

I thought these were awful on Jools Holland the other night - such a thin, limp sound.

limpcore

i wonder how much vampire weekend owes in student loans. columbia has to be pretty expensive. kudos to them for having the grit to record music while working jobs to pay school off

Does anyone want to go with me to the show in SF on Sunday? You can't smoke.

Oops. I searched for threads and thought this was ILE. My apologies. Please ignore the post above.

They're getting more push from MTV again this week. Between videos in the early morning hours (between 6 a.m. and 8 Eastern time) see them in short clips, riding bikes, singing, and chatting about their fave songs on their album, etc.

http://www.subterraneanblog.com/2008/03/04/mtv-artist-of-the-week-vampire-weekend/

O! I wish I had a television at times.

The best thing in that was the gesture.

http://www.mtv.com/overdrive/?id=1582660&vid=213890

John Jay and ButlerStax!

one of those videos features an appearance by an Official Columbia Squirrel (or possibly an Official Columbia Squirrat)

i dont really care about this band but im just dropping in to say jshepard's vv article was awful

kthnxbye

First off, this Friday's FADER radio was one of my favorites ever, because we played all music related to our Africa issue (mostly hiplife from Ghana, lest any deans and/or peens deem it necessary to take my specificity to task and/or publicly renounce our friendship - LO mfin L!). JShep, now working at Fader, on her blog

Vampire Weekend on Saturday Night Live tonight

Good lord, it's like they're constitutionally or contractually unable to do any sort of press more than four blocks from the corner of 114th and Amsterdam.

i think it's like the boy in the plastic bubble...the air would kill them

Actually I think it's more like they've figured out how to use the neighborhood as an image and marketing angle, which -- considering it's in Manhattan -- is kinda something.

Columbia should really give them a kickback on any increase in applications this fall.

Additional public-safety note: Koenig is surely being a little perverse by suggesting that a "late-night picnic in Morningside Park" is a good date idea.

Additional additional note: I'd have given this a 3.2 if I'd known Koenig honestly doesn't use serial commas. Can't we reconvene the PMRC and do something about this nonsense?

These VW dudes seem like the kind-of dorkissimos who wear baggy pleated Eddie Bauer khakis and chunky brown leather moccasins out in public; how they got anywhere is thanks purely to the magic of zeitgeist ... and being incredibly well-connected in aristocratic 2008 NYC.

why would they be worried about how much coal someone said they had? is it a reverse coke ref?

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Burt Stanton.

burt swear off this thread for your own health dude

Nah. Despising mediocrity and American worship of bland non-creativity is my raison d'être. A million brilliant artists and musicians live and die i nothingness, yet here we have ... another pile of oatmeal dogshit people can't shovel into their mouths fast enough.

burt_magill

FFFFF Ffff AAGGGOT BALLZ

12 boxes of frozen Morningstar vegan breakfast burritos fell on my head today, so pardon my uncontrolalble outbursts

They're included in the article on Brooklyn bands in the Sunday March 9th New York Times because, according to the article 3/4 of the band now live in that borough. If you care about sales figures--from that article- LCD Soundsystem 'Sound of Silver' sold 103,000 copies,MGMT 21,000 so far, and Yeasayer 15,000. No numbers for VW, which may get a boost from the Saturday Night Live appearance (I was just awake for "A Punk" whose vocals lacked the spirit of earlier renditions)

after last week, VW had sold 86k. (I don't have soundscan but I saw the figures reported somewhere - same place says MGMT are now up to 26k.)

also, wow, that's a great figure for yeasayer.

Additional public-safety note: Koenig is surely being a little perverse by suggesting that a "late-night picnic in Morningside Park" is a good date idea.

I LOL'd

Columbia should really give them a kickback on any increase in applications this fall.

yes

LOL at them having a fansite called OXFORD COMMA RIDDIM. Jesus.