If you’ve never heard of Vampire Weekend, you might mistakenly think they’re a Goth band. In reality, they are four guys who live in New York City and met while they were students at Columbia a few years ago. In fact, they were named “Whitest Band” on the blog Stuff White People Like, in case you find that reassuring (that last bit was pulled from Wikipedia, so the information can’t be guaranteed). On a personal note, my best song on Guitar Hero is A-Punk from Vampire Weekend’s first album, which means it can’t be too far from the mainstream.
Contra is their second album and has gotten really good reviews, but I’m sorry to say it is not currently on Rolling Stone’s top 100 list. Their sound is a little “pop” with a twist of alternative, and most of the songs on Contra are pretty upbeat. I have read that they like the idea of sounding like they’ve got an international flair, and some of their songs do sound a bit ethnic. One thing I like about the album is that the songs sounds pretty different from one to the next, which is nice if you’re just getting to know a band- otherwise everything sounds kind of the same when you start listening.
If you want a quirky introduction to Vampire Weekend, check out their video on Youtube for Giving Up the Gun and you will be treated to a girl playing tennis against (in this order) Joe Jonas, Jake Gyllenhaal and Lil Jon. I’m not sure I understand the correlation to the lyrics, but it’s pretty entertaining.
My suggestion if you want to check out a song or two from the album would be Holiday, Run or Cousins. I’ve heard Cousins on the radio, and I’ve also heard Horchata. All in all, the album is pretty upbeat and fun- I would recommend it.
Other singles I like right now:
· Broken Bells – The High Road
· Findlay Brown – Everybody Needs Love
· Jayhawks – Blue
· Wilco – Jesus, Etc.
More later!
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