A simple preview I wrote up for Phawker of a sold-out Vampire Weekend show in Philadelphia has set off rock critic/Pop Cesspool blogger Joe Warminsky. It’s comments like Joe’s that make my occasional “work” all worthwhile. Thanks, Joe!
Have you heard this band?
For those of you too lazy to click on over to Phawker, I wrote:
Vampire Weekend play a sold out show at First Unitarian Church tonight. If you can’t get in you’re not alone. Your parents were probably shut out too. The band’s debut album and style of music, which they cheekily refer to as “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa,” “Upper West Side Soweto,” “Campus,” and “Oxford Comma Riddim,” goes down easy, so easy that I’m sometimes reminded of “Escape (The Piña Colada Song)”. I’m sure they get more questions about raiding their parents’ Paul Simon and Peter Gabriel record collections than any young, smart, stylish band deserves, but that’s no reason to see if they hold up to the “Sun City” litmus test. Listen up, Moms and Dads: this is an album worth a raid on your kids’ collections. The kids are all right. Let ‘em stay out a little later after tonight’s show so they can grab a late bite at a diner and have a giggle. If this is a Vampire Weekend, they’ll have no trouble getting back into the swing of things come Monday morning – or Friday morning, in our town’s case.
They remind me of the English Beat. I like their sound and bet Wes Anderson is just dying to use their songs in his next movie.
I was gonna say Haircut 100, actually. Fun but totally disposable in a way that suggests this album will have a huge backlash three months from now but a small resurgence of interest around 2022 when I LOVE THE NAUGHTIES premieres on VH1.
Both great comparisons, dr john and the great 48!
I’ve never heard or heard of this band, but that dude’s vitriol makes me want to hear them more. It was great seeing the Sun City video again. Was there anyone cool from that era who wasn’t in it? It sounded pretty groovy too, in an 80s kind of way. I got full on chills for some reason when they dropped in that famous footage of Southern blacks getting the firehose turned on them.
I was at that show at the church last Thursday. I thought they were good, though to be honest I enjoy their record more. I was resistant to it at first because of all the hype and yeah I think a backlash is on the way (and I’m not sure if they can repeat this album’s catchiness), but I hear way more Talking Heads and esp. early XTC than the frequent and mostly inaccurate Paul Simon and esp. Peter Gabriel comparisons suggest. I also hear bits that are either stolen from or tributes to records like Odessey and Oracle, another aspect of their sound which wasn’t really been highlighted. But anyway, yeah I think the album’s great.