By 2013, the “Indie Sleaze” scene that had propelled Vampire Weekend to the high was being washed away with the social media growth. Yet, as an alternative, their album that 12 months, Modern Vampires of the City, additionally served as a launch pad for a brand new one: the Gen Z Tumblr era. While the band nonetheless appealed to their authentic fan base, many Gen Z children heading into their teenage years had been discovering them as they had been shaping their very own Tumblr period aesthetic.
What bloghouse and Myspace had been to millennials, a youthful crowd leaned right into a love for grunge vibes — reblogging footage of leather-based jackets, fishnet leggings, and edits of emo quotes, sometimes by rising alt stars like Lorde and Sky Ferreira, and veterans Arctic Monkeys. (Two of whom additionally had black-and-white-themed albums that had been launched the similar 12 months.)
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And Vampire Weekend was altering, too. Initially fashioned on the grounds of Columbia University when all the members had been of their early-20s, they had been now cemented into maturity and, with that, a unique musical mindset.
“There’s always something kind of haunting about the phrase ‘Modern Vampires of the City.’ And at first there was something that seemed kind of funny about calling a Vampire Weekend album Modern Vampires of the City, but then I do feel like there’s some deeper resonance there too,” lead singer Ezra Koenig informed NPR about the album’s title and constructing blocks upon its launch.
The aforementioned black-and-white cowl artwork, that includes a Neal Boenzi {photograph} of their hometown of NYC lined in smog, mirrored the course that the band took on this album, which turns 10 on May 14. Unlike their indie-preppy affect on the 2008 self-titled document or the success that adopted on 2010’s Contra, MVOTC was a mirrored image of grief in all types. Vampire Weekend’s members, in a 2013 interview with The New York Times, stated they considered it as the closing chapter in a musical trilogy. (They would go on to embrace collaborations and a carefree, jam-band model for his or her fourth a couple of years later.)
“I didn’t realize at first how many references there are to death and ticking clocks,” Koenig informed the publication. “I guess that’s what makes an album unified, these little musical and lyrical tropes.”
“This record, it has a kind of a tension that’s always there, which I’m proud of, which is unique from the first two,” Rostam Batmanglij added. “Even if the songs are mostly in a major key, there’s something that’s hanging out there that’s a little bit dark. And I think that’s reflective of the world.”
Batmanglij additionally co-produced MVOTC with Ariel Rechtshaid, additional signaling a change in Vampire Weekend’s course, as he had tackled the sound of their first two albums solo. Rechtshaid had produced Ferreira’s Ghost EP the 12 months prior, in addition to engaged on her debut album and with Charli XCX — giving a way of his darker, moodier pop collaborative background.
Yet, throughout the recording classes, in a profile of the band from 2013 for Pitchfork, Rechtshaid revealed that they “had a running joke throughout the making of the record — they would reference their own songs and I’d give them a blank stare. They’d say, ‘You’re such an asshole, you’ve never even listened to our music.’”
“Whenever we came up with something familiar sounding, it was rejected,” said Rechtshaid to Electronic Musician (through NBHAP). And it worked, as the band went on to win a Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album.
One of the album’s lead singles, “Diane Young,” doubled as a play on words and an obvious representation of this. Sure, it kept the faster rockabilly-inspired instrumental, likely to not alienate the past listeners, but it also found them at their sharpest lyrically — including a playfully-dark nod to the infamous curse with “But you got the luck of a Kennedy.”
There’s the loss of love on “Hannah Hunt,” a fictional tale but still titled after a woman that the band’s lead singer knew in a college class. However, the concept of grief crosses over most clearly on “Hudson,” whose opening lines set the story of the famous explorer, and “Step,” which doesn’t have a notable lore, save for a Souls of Mischief reference, but is still utterly devastating.
“I had this little poem I’d written once, imagining Henry Hudson when he was first exploring over here,” Koenig said to NME. “There was something that always struck me as dark and funny that Hudson Bay, which obviously was named after him, was the place that he was set adrift by his mutinous crew and left to die.”
Many Gen Z kids would’ve been in their early adolescence when Vampire Weekend debuted, and nearing the age the band was at the start of their career by the time MVOTC came out, as they entered teenhood. Inherently experiencing a coming of age, the concept of losing others from general breakups, addiction, and various aspects of death has become a clearer reality. “Everyone’s dying, but girl, you’re not old yet,” Koenig sings as one of the closing strains of “Step.”
And, with that, maybe the Gen Z love for this album (and lots of different beloved data throughout this period that leaned into nihilistic and hedonistic themes) doubled as the begin of an consciousness for what was to return. It’s the teenage years and the presumed loss of innocence simply earlier than barrelling into maturity. Granted, Vampire Weekend’s members had been grappling with getting into a unique stage of life, however the idea of grieving previous selves and what as soon as was nonetheless stays.
In the years since MVOTC’s launch, even after founding member Batmanglij departed the band in 2016, they’ve nonetheless confirmed that out of the darkness comes a sunnier, cheerful return, as current on 2019’s Father of the Bride. Bonus factors if Haim is there too.
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