Vampire Weekend

For the love of all things holy and sacred, what hasn't been said about Vampire Weekend. Can I possibly enlighten you further? I first wrote about them back in August of '07 and was anxious to see how things shook out for the current indie darlings. Well, like many indie darlings before them they've hit mainstream with an appearance on Letterman and when you do a simple "vampire weekend" search on YouTube it returns ~665 results. I genuinely like Vampire Weekend. I'm not going to sit here and write that I know where their career is going to go, or say they suck because I want to be edgy, or say they have room to grow. It's just irritating in some ways to see a band become successful and then get dissed because they're successful. Isn't that what all artists want anyway? Don't they want to be acknowledged for doing good work? Don't they want to actually make money doing what they love? I totally understand people enjoying the feeling of "discovering" a band and claiming it as their band baby. They tell only their closest friends, and spread the gospel sparingly because they see them as a crown jewel in their indie music crown of smugness. I can admit to doing this on occassion. I'm okay with saying that, because I enjoy the music. I'm not saying a band is great just to say I know them, or just to impress another music geek. I want to tell people about music I enjoy, music that I can listen to over and over. Vampire Weekend is a solid young band. They manage to sound "fresh" because they drawn from less likely predecessors like Paul Simon or Peter Gabriel. It's not only this fact, but also they mostly manage to do it well. They aren't going to change the world. They aren't going to sell out The Meadowlands. They're going to be played on the radio and people that don't know much about music will like them. Their music is fun, smart, and generally happy sounding. I could tell this was most likely going to happen when I saw the in concert a week or so ago. I had gotten wind that the audience was a mix of longtime fans and newbies just by overhearing conversations and looking around. I kinda knew it was downhill when a friend told me that her mom "really liked this new, cute band named Vampire Weekend." OF COURSE your band is going to lose street cred when moms start liking them. Nothing is as cool when your mom likes it at the same time you do. That is an immutable law of nature. (Love you mom).

Anyway, enough of my ranting and raving. Vampire Weekend's debut self-titled album is really good. It's not going to blow your mind or make you change religions, but it may perk up your ears and put a little bounce in your step. Because I have an affection for cover songs the song posted below is Vampire Weekend covering one of my favorite Radiohead songs. I know, I know it can't possibly do the original justice, but it's still interesting to hear their take on a classic song that is (already) 10+ years old. I could go on and say how much I was appalled by the review of the concert I went to in Variety by Steven Mirkin. I swear, the review is so bad and scathing I wouldn't be surprised if the dude is 45 and stayed for the first 3 songs and left to beat traffic (very L.A.). Hope you enjoy the track below.