Modern Vampires of NY Hat

• Embroidery on a navy ‘47 Brand Clean Up adjustable baseball cap
• 100% garment-washed cotton twill
• Adjustable strap back w/ snap slide buckle closure
• Unstructured, low-profile, six-panel dad hat
• Pre-curved visor

If you blindly pulled any Vampire Weekend album out of a hat, you could probably make a convincing case that the one you drew is their greatest work. Modern Vampires of the City, however, is the one that seems destined to appear on future “best album” lists. It’s the record where the band transitioned from questioning the importance of Oxford commas to questioning God, where Ezra Koenig stopped asking how he could pretend to not want to see old romantic partners again to asking why we exist at all.

The music remains as bouncy as ever, but there’s a real sense of dread that runs through every song, many of which contain references to clocks counting down, fire and flames, and loss. The band's doom spiral bottoms out on the double header of existential crises that are the manic “Ya Hey“ and the eerie “Hudson.” On the former, Koenig shouts at the heavens via a pitched up choir of Bukowskis, while on the latter, the weight of the world and Koenig’s doubt drag the music into the minor key and completely into the dark.

“Young Lion” ends the album with a sense of closure and peace, but one only has to look to “Harmony Hall” to see that Koenig’s unease still festers underneath the surface of the band’s music. When he laments that “I thought that I was free from all that questionin’” and quotes his own lyrics from “Finger Back” (“I don’t want to live like this, but I don’t wanna die”), it becomes clear that some questions are too big to answer, and as he reiterates in the chorus of “Hope” (from Only God Was Above Us), being able to accept that may be the best anyone can hope for.

Random Notes and disclaimers:

Buyers in Michigan are subject to sales tax (sorry!).

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