Read our preliminary ranking of Vampire Weekend's first album in five years.
Five years removed from the earthy, album of the year, nominated fourth full-length Father of the Bride, Vampire Weekend is back with another modern rock moonshot. For everything Fatherits reserved leanings – and despite drummer Chris Tomson's run-ins with the noodling world, via psychedelic side project Taper's Choice – Vampire Weekend's fifth full-length, Only God was above usreturns the band to more familiar, learned territory.
Already one of the best lyricists of his rock generation, Ezra Koenig further refines his craft here, delivering philosophical musings with laconic style and flair. And while Only GodIts average track length is a minute longer than on any other Vampire Weekend album, the songs are none the worse for it – rather, Vampire Weekend earns those running times by filling them with a wealth of ideas. Longtime producer Ariel Rechtshaid, who, since Rostam Batmanglij left the band nearly a decade ago, has become the de facto fourth vampire – and helps give Only Godof frequent chaos remarkable clarity. (Rechtshaid's is just one of the impressive lineup of note names; they've worked with session musicians who've collaborated with artists from Travis Scott to Kamasi Washington Only Godand Dave Fridmann worked with Vampire Weekend for the first time as a mixer.)
The new album internalizes the decade that has passed since the band's impressive 2013 masterpiece, Modern Vampire of the City: Only God it often feels like a funhouse of Vampire Weekends past, drawing on the concise grooves of their 2008 self-titled debut and 2010 follow-up On the contrary with Modern Vampires' adornment and Fatherhis wild side. Knowing musical and lyrical allusions in the group's catalog, Only God it's Vampire Weekend at its meta best.
Check out a preliminary ranking of the 10 tracks Only God was above us.
-
Capricorn
Channeling the wistful ballads of Vampire Weekend past, this single's power lies in its paradoxical – and self-referential – lyrics: The killer couplet 'Too old for dying small / Too small to live only' evokes both Modern Vampires“Diane Young” (“If Diane Young Doesn't Change Her Mind”) and Father's “Harmony Hall” (“I don't wantna live like this / But I don't wantna die”).
-
Preschool gangsters
“PREP-SCHOOL GANGSTERS”, the cover of the December 16, 1996 issue of New York stated the magazine, describing rich kids who “cruise the city in chauffeured cars, blasting rap, selling pot to their classmates.” It's a quintessential juxtaposition for Vampire Weekend – this is the band that punctuated reviews with Lil Jon references on “Oxford Comma” – and it feeds thematically into this mid-album track. Session musicians spice up the relatively light tune, with drums from Blood Orange's Dev Hynes and lively violin work from Eric Gorfain (Beyoncé, Frank Ocean) and Daphne Chen (Travis Scott, Lizzo).
-
Mary Boone
With its spare lyrics and weak chorus, Vampire Weekend's sentimental paean to the influential New York art dealer instantly feels like Modern Vampires fan favorite 'Ya Hey'. Blooming drums, borrowed from Soul II Soul's 1989 smash “Back To Life (However Do You Want Me),” invigorate and elevate the track.
-
Pravda
Myth-making in New York City comes in many forms. “I know what's under Manhattan / I know who's buried in Grant's grave,” Koenig informs listeners early on in “Pravda” over the track's soft bass. Later, he describes a less grand, but no less authentic, New York: “I had a job in Penn Station / Down at a tie shop called Tiecoon.”
-
Ice piano
No relaxing a la Modern Vampires“Obvious bike” or Father's “Hold You Now”: On the album first, Koenig reintroduces himself with an emphatic “F–k the world” and within 90 seconds the album is off to the races. With thunderous drums, distorted guitars and dramatic string arpeggios, the album's shortest song excitingly follows its short duration.
-
Hope
On the strongest, most ambitious album closer in Vampire Weekend's catalog – and, at eight minutes, the longest song the band has recorded by a wide margin – Koenig delivers turn after disappointing turn (“The palm tree didn't rise / Now the half the body is paralysed”) while always returning to the same exhausted exhortation: “I hope you let it go”. But halfway through, the track's lyrical weight is overcome by a bold, beautiful instrumental bridge – a melodic turn worthy of the historic urban grandeur the band so often invokes.
-
The Surfer
Former Vampire Weekend member Batmanglij co-wrote and co-produced “The Surfer,” which rides a heady wave of dubby bass, melodramatic strings, horn-like synths, and drifting slide guitar. “False seer / Scandalized by fate,” Koenig muses over the bluesy instrumental. “Broken bodybuilder / Crushed under the weight.”
-
Gen-X cops
If a classic Vampire Weekend rave-up like “A-Punk” or “Cousins” took some acid and wandered into a house of mirrors, it might come off like “Gen-X Cops,” which gives a darker turn to the complex. promotional early material. (It is Thomson's only co-author Only God(and one of only three tracks on the album to feature both members of the band's original rhythm section.) The lyrics mirror the full instrumental, as Koenig laments, “A gang of Gen-X cops come together / Trembling before our humanity ».
-
I'm connecting
With rhythmic nods to “Mansard Roof” – the first track on Vampire Weekend's debut album – drummer Chris Tomson links “Connect” to the band's past. The benchmark is instructive, because otherwise this dense, jazzy epic shows just how much Vampire Weekend's musical scope has grown over the course of their career.
-
Classical
Armed with one of the best riffs he's ever written, Koenig spans the culture's great themes in just over four minutes – and delivers a track instantly worthy of the Vampire Weekend pantheon. As guitars shriek and saxophones wail, Koenig transcends controlled chaos to wax poetic about times of war and peace and offers a bleak summary of how history is written: “Untrue, rude and unnatural / How cruel to time / It's becoming a classic.”
from our partners at https://www.billboard.com/lists/vampire-weekend-only-god-was-above-us-songs-ranked/