vampire weekend - only god was above us, out april 5, 2024

the snippet of music in the trailer sounds cool

Listening to too much Dead (via Jake Longstreth of Time Crisis & Richard Pictures fame) and playing big festivals with an expanded band is a dangerous musical influence, but the last album was the first VW album I listened to more than once, so I'm looking forward to it.

they were pretty incredible on their last tour

I don't think you even need to fully blame Longstreth, considering that one of their very own has his own jam band with Dave Harrington and Alex Bleeker!

I didn't like the last album at all, but there's like a dozen and a half cuts from their first three albums that I still enjoy. Mixed together, they add up to a great little album.

re: it being a double lp - the tracks are arranged 3/3/3/1 so it may be that the last track is some sort of epic

note for note cover of dark star from venetta, oregon

But only if it has one of those fancy hologram things of naked pole guy. (iykyk)

Wasn't Vampire Weekend last album also a double as it had like 16 or 17 songs?

It was a double on vinyl because it was 58 minutes long and they didn't want to pull a Rundgren.

they did talk a bunch about how it was a 'double album' though which was a weird move when it was that short

like the idea of a 'double album' isn't very meaningful these days but if you're going to appeal to the classic concept of a double album at least make it 70+ minutes

It has 18 songs and great points ufo

We haven't gotten to the point in CD nostalgia were an artist will rhapsodize about making a classic CD Bloat-style LP (unless TayTay did & I missed it).

i want to say drake did but that might just be me misremembering conversations about streaming bloat albums

I loved that about De La Soul - 3 Feet High and Rising is like a perfect CD-length album, closing in on 70 minutes. I would never break it apart into four sides.

Last album was the album that sealed the deal for me whereas previously I'd regarded them with an air of "I kind of like this but I'm not sure I want to like it?", so hopefully this will be decent.

Ummm... but do I recall there was some chat a while ago about Ezra being into some dodginess? What became of that?

https://www.rookiemag.com/2016/09/the-infinity-diaries/

there was also the article from her a few years ago detailing an abusive ex where some of the details lined up with ezra, some of them didn't really, and she made a point of not naming anyone. there haven't been any further developments so it's still that at best he's a creep who dates 18 year olds (and rostam is also terrible for enabling that) and at worst he's much much worse.

https://live.staticflickr.com/4032/4718435334_db1f7b8151_c.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lCmyFCj580

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kW9Qk00693c

some great production tricks that deserve better songs? i feel completely unmoved despite the arrangements being full of interesting ideas

otm

capricorn feels like a retread, but i dug gen x cops

^^ otm

Ariel Reichstadt putting in work.

yeah they sound cool

So where did all the double album talk come from? Wikipedia has the full tracklist up and it's only 10 songs/47 minutes.

Double vinyl at 45 rpm

Ahhh, thanks.

That second chorus on Capricorn tho

Capricorn sounds like a song Ezra can write in his sleep - but yeah that second chorus is very cool

this one is pretty great

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nP2FbpYs4t0

i also have come fully around on "capricorn," good song

Koenig looks like early '80s Lindsay Buckingham in those closeups.

Reminds me of Los Panchos rendition of El Negro Zumbon. Which could made a good VW sample tbh

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

These new songs sound like Belle and Sebastian in a way that previous VW, to my ear, does not.

yeah i like this one more than the other two, songwriting feels like less of a re-tread and the arrangement is even better

It's painful to watch an upright bass being played like that

Super amped for this record. "Classical" is a total heater.

yeah i'm just bored by koenig as a songwriter now, album doesn't do much for me

Yeah 2 of the new songs are nice enough like ok besides. the other 2 I don’t care about. Out of 10 that doesn’t look good…

there's still some interesting production tricks across the whole album but eh

"mary boone" is cute and low stakes, like i imagine the rest of the album will be

I liked the grab-bag what-the-hell half-of-these-songs-are-outtakes vibe of the last one, this one is not suggesting anything similar

Does "Mary Boone" use the Soul II Soul shufflebeat?

fuck this ephebophile foprock

banger. no skips

band who time and time again delivers the most grower not shower albums and we got the gallery shitting on it after first skim. it's okay, we'll still be here when you come around.

did not anticipate The Surfer, which opens like some lost track off one of my 90s underground hip hop mixtapes before heading into All Things Must Pass territory.

this blends all the things i love from MVOTC and Contra.

Ever analytical, Koenig mused that Vampire Weekend’s albums each reflected patron saints. He named Paul Simon for the band’s self-titled 2007 debut, Joe Strummer and Sublime for “Contra” from 2010, Leonard Cohen for “Modern Vampires of the City,” and the Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter, along with Phish, for “Father of the Bride.” The new album, he said, may reflect a short-lived tour he didn’t get to see: the 1997 pairing of Rage Against the Machine and Wu-Tang Clan, which reached the cover of Rolling Stone.

From New York Times article

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/20/arts/music/vampire-weekend-only-god-was-above-us.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare&sgrp=c-cb

A Petrusich praises the new album in a lyrics focused review in the New Yorker

In my head FOTB was underwhelming not because it was a hollow recitation of VW’s winning formula but because it mostly jettisoned various components of that formula, which components turned out to have been a crucial part of the band’s appeal - this is really underscored by how precisely my increased enjoyment of OGWAU correlates to the appearance of a course correction. But maybe I am idiosyncratic on this point and the surprising arrangements and flourishes aren’t that important to most VW fans?

because you specifically are rad, don't change

Right back at ya, Austin.

I gotta ask what does it even mean to be a “new jersey” I’m reading without knowing what that reference is.

Every huge artist has their "New Jersey" - a huge event album that ultimately feels a bit hollow & signals a career decline

Not sure #11 in the UK is much to sing about. All the Twitter terfs got Roisin to #5 and this week The Libertines made #1

― groovypanda, Wednesday, 17 April 2024 19:22 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

i wasn't singling it out as a good thing. the previous three were all top three. the scotland chart intrigues me though as i feel releases by long established rock/indie/whatever acts almost always do better there(?), even if the actual sales numbers are probably small

In my head FOTB was underwhelming not because it was a hollow recitation of VW’s winning formula but because it mostly jettisoned various components of that formula, which components turned out to have been a crucial part of the band’s appeal - this is really underscored by how precisely my increased enjoyment of OGWAU correlates to the appearance of a course correction. But maybe I am idiosyncratic on this point and the surprising arrangements and flourishes aren’t that important to most VW fans?

FOTB not a New Jersey.

I resist coming back to this one (although I quite like most of the tunes) because of the clattery, compressed production. In particular the drums — I hate them. I hate the way they sound, and I hate the space they take up in the mix. They actively annoy me while I’m listening.

I think I’m v much in the minority on this.

You are, but not alone!

Having LOTS OF THINGS HAPPENING FAST on the drums does not equal "good beats."

― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Friday, April 5, 2024 3:16 PM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

Perhaps inevitably from its grave debuting sales, it only lasted one week on either the US or UK charts. (Actually, I'd have expected at least a second week in the UK, at number 76 or something, but nah).

Only God Can Chart Us

Vampire Weakened

I dunno, they are playing 4 nights in London at 3-5000 capacity venues so I think there is still a solid audience for them (and two nights in Manchester) - I'm looking forward to it anyway...

They pretty much sold out two nights at MSG with over five months to go. Maybe they've already turned into a legacy act - no one buys the new stuff but they'll pay big for an arena show?

16 years since their debut album. For the stones it was basically Tattoo you (64-81). Yeah maybe they are legacy act for aged fans now !

Good episode of NYT Popcast hosted by Jon Pareles feat. Amanda Petrusich and Matthew Strauss

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/17/arts/music/popcast-vampire-weekend.html

without any evidence or argument to back up my position: my feeling is this would have performed better if they hadn't gone major

They did that a long time ago; I reckon over 90% of Vampire Weekend songs are in a major key

Get your limited edition VW metrocard:

https://www.amny.com/transit/vampire-weekend-metrocards-available-manhattan/

You’d think they’d have one with the album cover.

Yeah, it does seem like Steven Siegel the cover photographer/artist might've denied them the rights for this purpose, since it would've worked perfectly.

Saw these guys Saturday night and was really impressed with how good they've gotten as a live band. Way more muscular at times, particularly the drums, and willing to jam out a little bit and get weird. The setlist was great, though I'd hoped for a little more Contra era stuff. The biggest surprise and highlight was a noisier take on "New Dorp. New York", a song Ezra did with Sbtrkt way back when. They've also gotten really good at constructing a good set flow. Even the encore trick of taking audience requests for songs from other artists and taking half-hearted stabs at them was more endearing than I thought it might be. I'd love to hear a live album from this tour.

yeah, saw them last night, great show, highlights include the live version of "Pravda" (so lovely and beautiful) and the encore of requests

I'll repeat, but they really need to release a live album from this tour. It's crazy how tight they are (well, obv not that encore request segment) and how they take some of the songs for a walk.

Totally! Fully enjoyed their show last night at a packed MSG.They sounded great and were having a lot of fun with it. I do wish they would have continued what they did last tour and took requests from thier catalogue for the encore instead of random covers. With 5 albums there is plenty of material to pull from so that was kind of an odd choice imo.

They did a grunge version of Bambina which was a high light tho

As for the encore they did do a pretty fledged out version of Jokerman which ruled

They played a snippet of their cover of Jokerman at the show I saw and it was awesome and I really wished we'd gotten the whole song.

saw the first 90 minutes or so of the sunday matinee show before my 6yo tapped out, love the septet arrangements. "sunflower" and "this life" in particular

Had a lot of fun seeing them last night, snatching up some cheap tickets the night before. They played a number of songs I wouldn't call favorites, but worked very well live, like "Sunflower". Lighting was excellent too. We had a long drive back and ducked out right before the encore and apparently missed "Ya Hey" ;_;

i caught them live last night and they sounded incredible. god bless baio’s shameless dance moves. it was an interesting crowd, much more intergenerational than i expected; lots of older boomers who sang along and knew the words to every song

lots of songs sounded identical to the record (aside from maybe extending a solo), but the ones where they switched up the arrangement more extensively were really good. the “90s version” of bambina was great, they could totally do an album in that style (they also nailed breeders ‘cannonball’ in the covers section)

watched the stream of their eclipse show last year and was super impressed, especially by the piano player during "connect," which is a true workout. also, that was apparently ezra on piano for the recording? impressive.

yeah they are a great live band and could just keep touring forever like DMB or something

They're always hit and miss for me, but OGWAS is brilliant. The Atmos mix is incredible if yr into that sorta thing.

The Atmos mix is incredible if yr into that sorta thing.

So it is - thanks for pointing this out!

So goddamn good last night at Bayfront Park. They renewed the practice of crowdsourcing for cover requests

What did they cover?

Bits of "Hips Don't Lie," "This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)," Eurythmics' "Sweet Dreams."