Vampire Weekend

Mixing well-read indie rock with Afro-pop, ska, hip-hop, ’80s pop, and more, Vampire Weekend has helped define the sound of indie music from the 2000s onward. After establishing the foundations of their lively, literate style with 2008′s Vampire Weekend, they quickly grew from music blog favorites into a chart-topping act: They’re the first indie group to have two consecutive albums (2010′s Contra and 2013′s Modern Vampires of the City, their first Grammy-winning album) enter the Billboard 200 at number one. On each of their albums, Vampire Weekend complemented their signature sound with ever-evolving sounds and ideas. They folded jam-rock and psychedelic soul into their wide-open musings on the complexity of everyday life in the 21st century on 2019′s Father of the Bride and distilled their memories of a bygone New York City into the densely layered reflections of 2024′s Only God Was Above Us. Vocalist/guitarist Ezra Koenig, drummer Chris Baio, multi-instrumentalist Rostam Batmanglij, and bassist Chris Tomson met when they were finishing up their studies at Columbia University. They formed Vampire Weekend in early 2006 out of Koenig and Tomson’s hip-hop collaboration L’Homme Run. Taking their name from a short film Koenig worked on during the summer between his freshman and sophomore years, the band started out by playing gigs at the university’s literary societies and at parties. The following year, they issued their self-released eponymous EP as well as the “Mansard Roof” single on Abeano Records and the “A-Punk/Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa” single on Free News Projects. Praise from music blogs led to several appearances at that year’s CMJ Music Marathon, and Vampire Weekend signed with XL Recordings soon after. The label reissued “Mansard Roof,” and the group began recording their debut album in locations ranging from a barn to the bandmembers’ apartments to Brooklyn’s Tree Fort studio. Arriving in January 2008, Vampire Weekend was one of the year’s most popular indie releases, debuting within the Top 20 of both the American and U.K. album charts and ultimately earning Platinum certification in both countries; meanwhile, the singles “A-Punk” and “Oxford Comma” also charted in the U.S. and the U.K. The band then toured for the better part of two years, while Batmanglij gathered additional accolades by releasing an album with Discovery, his electro side project with Ra Ra Riot’s Wes Miles. During this time, Vampire Weekend returned to the studio to record their second album, Contra, which arrived in January 2010. Featuring the singles “Horchata” and “Cousins,” the LP debuted at the top of the Billboard 200 chart and earned a Grammy nomination for Best Alternative Music Album. Contra was certified Gold in the U.S., U.K., Canada, and Australia, and earned Diamond certification for its sales throughout Europe. Late in 2011, the band returned to the studio to record their third long-player with Ariel Rechtshaid, who co-produced the album with Batmanglij. The group wrote and recorded the album at New York’s SlowDeath Studios, Hollywood’s Vox Recording Studios, and Batmanglij’s New York apartment. Described by Koenig as a darker, more organic set of songs, Modern Vampires of the City was released in May 2013. Like Contra, the album debuted at the top of the Billboard 200 — making Vampire Weekend the first rock band on an independent label to enter the charts at number one with two consecutive albums — and it also won the Grammy for Best Alternative Album in 2014. Also like its predecessor, Modern Vampires of the City was certified Gold in the U.S., U.K., and Canada. Early in 2016, Batmanglij announced he had left Vampire Weekend but would continue to play with them in the future. That year, the band began work on their fourth album with collaborators including Rechtshaid, Justin Meldal-Johnsen, Danielle Haim, and Dirty Projectors’ Dave Longstreth. Early in 2019, Vampire Weekend released several pairs of songs, including February’s “Harmony Hall” and “2021,” before the arrival of the double album Father of the Bride that May on the Columbia Records imprint Spring Snow. The LP topped the Billboard 200 and received nominations for both Album of the Year and Best Alternative Music Album at the 2020 Grammy Awards. The band commissioned jazz saxophonist Sam Gendel and jam band Goose to create epic, all-new versions of the track “2021” from Father of the Bride. The resulting 40:42 arrived, appropriately, in 2021. It topped the Billboard 200 and received Grammy nominations for Album of the Year and Best Alternative Music Album, winning in the latter category. Vampire Weekend commissioned jazz saxophonist Sam Gendel and the jam band Goose to create reimaginings of the Father of the Bride track “2021” that were each twenty minutes and twenty-one seconds long; the resulting 40:42 arrived, appropriately, in 2021. While the band worked on its next album, they issued vinyl releases of Father of the Bride shows as Frog on the Bass Drum Vol. 1 and Frog on the Bass Drum Vol. 2. Appearing in May 2023, Only God Was Above Us was co-produced by Koenig and Rechtshaid and channeled memories of New York City in the late 1990s and early 2000s with its noisy experimental pop.~ Heather Phares