While today is marked on my calendar as, “Padre’s B-Day”, I have a sneaking suspicion that January 12th has an alternative significance to most music enthusiasts. Today, lingering impatience can fade by the wayside along with the all the premature hype, because, Vampire Weekend’s sophomore album, ‘Contra’, has been released.
If countless sold out shows across the US and Europe is an accurate indication of fan interest, I would say people are pretty excited about Vampire Weekend’s new music. So after two years, was it worth the wait? My first impression…yeah, there are some pretty neat tracks on ‘Contra’, but give me a few more listens because I don’t get it yet.
“Horchata” (the first single) kicks off the album with some harmonium drone and is followed by the track, “White Sky”, a song you might recognize if you’ve seen Vampire Weekend live. Next up is the track, “California English”, which has been receiving some mixed attention due to the autotune effect on Ezra Koenig’s voice. Why so surprised/disappointed folks…did you forget about Vampire Weekend’s previous fascination with Lil Jon? It makes perfect and reasonable sense; Vampire Weekend is obviously intrigued by “Lil” things.
About halfway through the album you arrive at the track, “Cousins”, which is the most memorable part of ‘Contra’ for me. It’s frenetic, clever, and highlights the bands’ ability to create fresh sounding music. The last three tracks on the album seem to be unnecessarily long, they sound promising during the first minute or so, but they aren’t really attention holders.
Now, after multiple encounters with ‘Contra’, I come away mostly ambivalent with a couple new additions to my “currently into” playlist. I do not think this album is as immediate as their debut; it requires a bit of persistence…so go grab a granola bar.
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