Vampire Weekend - Father of the Bride

There are few bands so reliable as Vampire Weekend, but since those heady days of 2008 where indie clubs around the world were dancing awkwardly to Oxford Comma and A-Punk, the band have matured into this eclectic, world-music sampling enigma and Father of the Bride may prove to be their most divisive of their four LPs yet. It's been an excruciating wait since 2013's Modern Vampires of the City, and that wait for fans may have been appeased by this swollen selection of eighteen tracks.

Behind the scenes, though, everyone's been busy. The departure of band member Rostam Batmanglij in 2016 would've been enough to shake things up, but Ezra Koenig and co. have also been busy phoning in some new guests and producers that're new to the Vampire Weekend lexicon: three tracks here feature Danielle from HAIM, and there are also credits for Mark Ronson, ILoveMakonnen and long-term Childish Gambino producer, Ludwig Göransson. There are constants, however - Batmanglij returns to work on two tracks, whilst Ariel Rechtshaid produces the entirety of the album once more. Anyone fearing a complete overhaul needn't do so.

In an earlier teaser of this project whilst it was still under the guise of 'mitsubishi macchiato', Koenig claimed this was a "little more springtime than the last one" and if the inclusion of 'Harmony Hall' right off the bat doesn't sell as advertised then I don't know what will. There's literal birdsong and the traditional voices of a Solomon Islands choir on the brief intro 'Hold You Now', but Harmony Hall is where the cogs properly start turning. Sounding more than a little inspired by Primal Scream's Screamadelica era, the song is simultaneously upbeat and infectious, but also plagued with disdain at the rise of antisemitism in high class society: "Anybody with a worried mind could never forgive the sight/ of wicked snakes inside a place you thought was dignified". As far as springtime reverie goes, there can't really be a more sunkissed instrumental surge than that on 'This Life', which deceptively interpolates ILoveMakonnen's "Tonight" into a war-like romantic turmoil.

There are throwbacks to their more guitar-driven days: 'Bambina' is a cut that could easily segue into their self-titled debut and bounces around tremendously, while their penchant for naming examples of cultural Americana are present on 'How Long?' Some of FOTB's most interesting cuts come from its new explorations though; HAIM's Danielle is most prominent on 'Married in a Gold Rush', where the former Hanging Gardens of Babylon of a relationship are now a dry, barren desert. Their voices blend finely, and do again later on 'We Belong Together' where their fictional relationship finds a joyous conclusion ("if there's not some grand design, how'd this pair of stars align?"). BloodPop, best known for his hit Friends with Justin Bieber, but also for tampering with careers of burgeoning indie talent with some questionable pop direction, also emerges on two of the album's weakest tracks; 'Spring Snow' is a whimpering, pallid end to the album, whilst 'Unbearably White' proves the most divisive track. Some are infatuated with it, but I regret to say I'm in the "indifferent" camp. It just meanders along with a few pauses for tense strings, and feels like something thrown in because its title is a playful jab at their critics.

The concept of a Vampire Weekend album track standing on its own terms and having almost nothing in similar with the rest of the album isn't exactly new, but it's no less jarring here: tracks like 'Big Blue' and 'Rich Man' break up the pace of the record in sometimes frustrating ways, although the latter is certainly charming enough with its strings to be forgiven. Steve Lacy of The Internet pops in for a quick one-two of 'Sunflower' and 'Flower Moon', and they rather stick out as a brief experimental detour from the album's general theme - 'Flower Moon' moreso with its cloying autotuned intro that thankfully evolves into a cluttered, rich chunk of baroque pop. The band manage to keep it together at pivotal moments, though: 'Sympathy' is a breathtaking change of pace that sits somewhere between flamenco and Simon and Garfunkel, and towards the end this bassline kicks in that's just fantastic. '2021' resurrects their signature childlike sound through the means of a Japanese ambient instrumental played in stores in the 1980s and it's just effortlessly charming, whilst the album's closer, 'Jerusalem, New York, Berlin' is both a gorgeous, serene ending and a further exploration of Koenig's Jewish heritage; a pensive reflection on the state of the world.

A hundred years or more
It feels like such a dream
An endless conversation since 1917
Now the battery is too hot
It's burning up in its tray
Young marriages are melting
And dying where they lay

Another example of a project going on for too long and boring some of the listeners? Perhaps, but the productions here are so rich and varied that the challenge of trying to whittle it down into something more manageable would've surely been impossible. "There's something for everyone" is never the ringing endorsement of a music critic, because it implies there's plenty that isn't for you - but even the tracks that fall somewhat short or play with a dissatisfying style are done so with care and a rich lyricism that we've come to expect. Post-Batmanglij, the band may still be trying to recover, but there's enough about Father of the Bride to keep the wheels turning.

Rating: 8/10
Highlights: Harmony Hall, Sympathy, This Life, We Belong Together, Married in a Gold Rush
Avoid: Spring Snow

Artwork Watch: It looks more like the logo for a 1990s football tournament but I'll take it
For fans of: over-analysing lyrics about a failing relationship to be about police brutality; a good jam

Coming next: Carly Rae Jepsen