I like Vampire Weekend. I really do. But I think there lyrics are strange at times. Not that they are specifically bad, but sometimes they don't fit together with the accompaniment. It creates a weird chasm or something like that. But, as I will try and explain, this chasm between what Ezra Koenig 'says', and what the band actually 'does' might in fact be a huge part of their allure. I find that divide very typical of post-millenial life. And of a lot of post-millenial indierock as well. But I'll get to that in a bit. I have to warn though, these readings probably overinterprets a lot, and misinterprets at times... But I find that much more fun than under-interpreting...
Let's begin with song number two: White Sky. It's an incredibly sweet song, probably the song on the album with the strongest influence from Afro-pop. Just delicious. And as the P4K Track-of-2010 list states: 'And that's not even counting the simple, ecstatic pleasures of one of the year's best wordless choruses' But I don't think the wordless chorus is just meant to be 'pleasurable'. I actually think there is a specific point to it. The verses are about finding the sublime in the everyday, well stated in the lines: 'A little stairway, a little piece of carpet / a pair of mirrors that are facing one another / Out in both directions, a thousand little Julia's / that come together in the middle of Manhattan' The second verse is about the banalization of modern art, juxtaposed with a skatepark (not enterily sure how that fits with anything), third verse is about questioning the ordinary. And then the bridge says: 'You waited since lunch / It all comes at once' and the thing that comes is unspeakable. THAT is why the chorus is wordless. It's a song that juxtaposes everyday banality with the unusual, the controlled and rational with the uncontrollable. The feeling that comes to you can't be formulated, and can only be represented by the wordless. There is a world down here, of which we can speak, and there is the White / Wide Sky. It's a song about the Sublime, but I wouldn't call it a Sublime song... But it's very sweet.
Next song: Holiday. Again, a song about a world outside of the normal, this time described as a longing for vacation. But there are a few lines that are key to the album: 'A vegetarian since the invasion / She'd never seen the word: 'Bombs' / She'd never seen the word: 'Bombs' blown up to 96 point Futura / She'd never seen an AK / in a yellowy Day-Glo display / A T-shirt so lovely it turned all the history books grey'. Again, there is the logical, the rational, but it can't compete with the sensoral, the sensual. Texts are fine, but it is images that shakes her.
The final example will be song number six: Run. It's a typical let's-run-away-from-it-all song. But again, there is no worded chorus. Instead, a mariachi-fanfare is summoned every time Ezra Koenig sings: 'It struck me that the two of us could RUN' This makes me think two things: 1) It expresses hope and life, but it remains very flimsy and unsubstantial, showing that the plan for escape is probably not that well thought out. 2) This is probably an over-interpretation, but my guess would be that the runners are headed for Mexico... But again, there is a focus on the unuttered, but in a different way. This feeling is not too sublime, but too vague to be formulated.
So the texts focus on the irrational, the fleeting. So far so good. But here is the problem: The music never, ever makes an impression of irrationallity... In general, I probably prefer music that sounds a bit more uncontrolled and desperate, but that is a question of preference. But there is a weird disconnect between the lyrics, focused on how things should not always be drawn out and explained, saying that sensoral impressions are stronger than logical explanations, while the songs are so exquisitely composed and drawn up. It always sounds like they are in complete control... To use their own example: Most of the time, they sound much more like a history book than like a T-shirt... It's nice, sweet, oftentimes great, but there is a weird dichotomy between music and lyrics, form and content if you like.
Is that a problem? Well, I think some people get really annoyed. There has always been something self-contradictory in lyrics like 'Who gives a shit about an Oxford Comma?' Well, no one did until you wrote a song about it, guys... So my answer would probably be you four... But I must admit, to me, that dichotomy makes the music that much more relatable. I know the feeling of sitting in my room and writing long essays about how important it is to really 'live' and 'feel' and how great stuff like 'the sublime' or 'jouissance' is... I think that a lot of young people have a wish to change the world, but end up spending their time reading books and watching films about the third world. We buy Fair Trade, and we have all the right intentions, and yet we don't really rebel... To me, this band actually describe the feeling of being young in a Post-Marxist world farily well, where there isn't anymore any other plausible substitute for society as we know it... As they sing in Cousins, with biting sarcasm: 'Dad was a risk-taker / His was a Shoe-maker / You, Greatest Hits 2006 little listmaker' Rebellion and social mobility, that was fulfilled by the previous generation. Now we sit around, and are actually quite comfortable, and we don't really know what to do with all the inequality still left in the world. But then we try to change the world through writing about music on the internet, as they sarcastically point out (and yup, I feel hit, to say the least...) But my counterpoint would be, that there really isn't anything world-changing about their well-composed, worldly influenced indie-pop.
And I think this dichotomy between rebellion and comfort is a part of a lot of successfull indiebands in this new millenium. M.I.A. was grilled over this question last year. Or what about the tourist-pop of Beirut? Or take Animal Collective. In this case, the dichotomy might be more obvious than any other place, although it's not intended to be. But Panda Bear has always been much more cosy and harmonic and nice, while Avey Tare is far more noisy and impulsive. The band has sung about not going to college and has made noise-records – Here Comes the Indian is a masterpiece, and still their best – but has also made nice and sweet music, about childhood or buying a house for your family. I prefer the Avey Tare part, but I feel like I'm in the minority on this question... Or Fleet Foxes, who have lyrics that are actually quite discomforting and has a potential for disturbing people, but then drowns them in a pond of harmless indie-folk-muzak. This split between rational / irrational has of course always been a part of music, but I would claim that it has become more central since the fall of the wall... But prove me wrong if the comment section if you like.
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