Vampire Weekend

Vampire Weekend formed in New York City in 2006 with Ezra Koenig singing and playing guitar, Rostam Batmanglij on just about everything else, Chris Tomson on drums and Chris Baio on bass, and their self-titled debut sounded like nobody else in the indie racket: crisp, clipped guitars, the bright, skipping lilt of Afropop and little chamber-music flourishes, all tied up in songs that barely broke a sweat. "A-Punk", "Oxford Comma" and "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa" were the calling cards, and critics fell hard, with some ranking it among the great debut albums.

Contra, in 2010, went straight to number one on the Billboard 200, a bigger, busier record that kept the charm intact, with "Holiday", "Cousins", "Giving Up the Gun" and "Horchata", and it earned them a Grammy nomination. Modern Vampires of the City, in 2013, turned more reflective and more ambitious, with "Diane Young", "Unbelievers" and "Step", topped the US charts and won the Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album.

Batmanglij left early in 2016, though he has kept turning up on their records as a writer, producer and player. Father of the Bride, in 2019, loosened up and spread out, with "Harmony Hall" and "This Life", topped the charts again, won the same Grammy and was nominated for Album of the Year. Now on Columbia, they released Only God Was Above Us in April 2024 to another round of rave reviews. On the countdowns, "A-Punk" and "Cousins" are still the ones that bounce highest.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.