Ivy League Band Vampire Weekend Gets Notice

By Broadside Interim Asst. Style Editor Pearson Jones

You would expect more from a bunch of Ivy League graduate students.

The quartet, known as Vampire Weekend, took a four-year degree from one of New York’s most reputable college, and gambled it away on a self-produced EP carried by a former lead singer of a comedic rap group.

This is a move you would expect from a bunch of careless GED dropouts, not Ivy league degree carrying-nerds. Vampire Weekend proved they have what it takes to impress fans in a world where MySpace surfing fanatics determine who the new modern day rockstars are going to be.

The band graced the cover of Spin magazine before their first album even came out due to how far their online fans elevated them. They’re still the only band today to do that. The afro-pop, anti-electric guitar band takes simple acoustic chords and rings them out through lazy keyboards creating a unique sound, but not one we haven’t heard before.

Front man Ezra Koenig and his band of graduates are coming out of the music scene that produced Interpol, The Strokes and the Yeah Yeahs Yeahs. Proof the New York scene is keeping the reputation of American bands alive.
Koenig’s plans no longer correspond with what he had in mind for himself after college.

“I graduated, I did Teach for America and I taught eighth grade in Brooklyn and, you know, whenever I’d find [time], after school I’d jump on the bus, record, we would play shows in New York as much as we could and then, you know, it worked out that we were able to record our own album and start talking to record labels and I was able to transition into doing this full time,” Koenig said. “So I guess in some ways the things I imagined in college kind of came to pass.

Vampire Weekend’s never-ending tour dates cater to their expanding fame. More bands seem to be blowing up over night these days, it’s a fad that bands are experiencing and embracing. Koenig confessed the rise to fame has altered the demographic that follows the band. Tight jeans, vintage tee wearing teen fans are getting replaced with an older era.

“I can definitely say that I’ve been very happy in the way that our audience has grown and not from a numerical standpoint; just that the type of people who come to shows you definitely get people who are in no way the kind of old images of like an Indie rock listener,” said Koenig.

This could possibly be signs the band may be leaving the old image of the Indie scene, and entering the MTV, TRL countdown category of the mainstream spotlight.

A convergence that peer pressures some indie bands to conform to the poppy sound most young bands betray on their sophomore albums.

“You know, we get people who probably are extremely mainstream, we get people who are in their 50s and 60s sometimes...it’s all across the board. So I’ve been happy to see how the audience has changed in that way,” said Koenig.
Vampire Weekend could end up being just another over-hyped band, flavor of the week maybe. We will enjoy it while it lasts.

Weekend has been given a nomination for a MTVu Woodie award for their new video Cape Code Kwassa Kwassa, a single off their debut album. The video has Koenig attending a very chic, New England aristocratic party. It holds well against the other nominees.