Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend

Track List

SIDE A
1. Mansard Roof
2. Oxford Comma
3. A-Punk
4. Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa
5. M79

SIDE B
1. Campus
2. Bryn
3. One (Blake's Got A New Face)
4. I Stand Corrected
5. Walcott
6. The Kids Don't Stand A Chance

Few debut albums arrive as fully realised as Vampire Weekend’s. The band formed on the campus of Columbia University and burst onto the late-2000s indie-rock scene looking provocatively preppy, singing songs that skewered privilege and colonialism using exactly the sort of worldly references and upper-crusty anecdotes that come with an Ivy League degree. That delicious contradiction also ran through Vampire Weekend’s sound—a fizzy mix of baroque flourish and African pop they winkingly dubbed Upper West Side Soweto. To some, the album felt like a bracingly exuberant sequel to Paul Simon’s Graceland, but others heard the aural embodiment of a Wes Anderson film: both twee and bold, incredibly specific and broadly charming, with everything in its right place. But as much as it reads like a collegiate concept LP, Vampire Weekend remains funny, affecting, bright and—above all—catchy.