Vampire
Weekend
Vampire Weekend
*****
New
Yorkers Vampire Weekend are your new favourite band! Aren’t
they? Well, they should be!
In this case, do believe the hype - their majestic, academic,
afro-punk-pop is the most joyous sound you’ll hear all
year. Vampire Weekend can relight the fire in your soul.
Their disparate influences (African music, indie-pop and western
classical compositions) are inexplicably fused into a wonderful
whole with such skill that it seems almost ridiculous they should
have ever been separate entities.
This is musically adventurous stuff, this is the sound Paul
Simon dreamt of creating with Graceland - exotic sounds filtered
through Western culture to startling affect. Like a funky Shins!
An Afro-beat Beach Boys! A new-wave, krautrock act! It’s
tiring just thinking about it - Vampire Weekend is headspinningly
wonderful.
‘M79’ takes a 17th Century classical composition
and infuses it with a stomping rock ‘n’ roll beat
as African tribal vocals and rhythms vie for attention.
‘Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa’ sees classic Afro-sounds
brilliantly realised in the indie-format and ‘One (Blake’s
Got A New Face)’ is Kraftwerk on a trip to Kenya.
‘APunk’ is a contender for song of the year already!
Lyrically the band are equally inventive and skewed - on mesmerising
pop, slow-burner ‘Oxford Comma’ Ezra Koenig asks,
“Who gives a fuck about an Oxford comma?” sticking
an obscure piece of punctuation into a missive about boasting
and liars. Nothing is straight forward with Vampire Weekend
and this is their strong point, they confuse and amuse with
every bizarre twist.
This debut release doesn’t win any prizes for perfect
production, but for its unique inventiveness and massive pop-hooks
it is the number one new indie-pop release.
by Chris Marks
