event Vampire Weekend

Few bands get big the way Vampire Weekend got big. The members met as students at Columbia University and seemed to take over the world more or less the next day, with a self-titled debut that scanned as worldly in more ways than one. Singer Ezra Koenig placed his tales of privileged youth atop the jubilant strumming and bouncy syncopation of West African music—a glib Graceland, of sorts—and the speed of the New York band’s ascendance, combined with accusations of musical colonization, caused certain kinds of controversy. Contra, a new album that features lush arrangements, a yen for sonic experimentation, and the rhyming of “horchata” and “balaclava,” promises to stoke the flames.

Few bands get big the way Vampire Weekend got big. The members met as students at Columbia University and seemed to take over the world more or less the next day, with a self-titled debut that scanned as worldly in more ways than one. Singer Ezra Koenig placed his tales of privileged youth atop the jubilant strumming and bouncy syncopation of West African music—a glib Graceland, of sorts—and the speed of the New York band’s ascendance, combined with accusations of musical colonization, caused certain kinds of controversy. Contra, a new album that features lush arrangements, a yen for sonic experimentation, and the rhyming of “horchata” and “balaclava,” promises to stoke the flames.