Member Since: 12/21/2010
Posts: 51,088
|
Named Pitchfork's Best New Track:
Quote:
The most divisive aspect of Vampire Weekend’s music has been Ezra Koenig’s willingness to recognize the emotional issues of the well-off and make them worthy of empathy. But the concerns about how grammar, consumer products or upbringing effects one’s identity all feel like chump change compared to “Ya Hey,” where Koenig pulls up a barstool to match wits with the guy who’s got the most daunting luxury problems of all: God.
It’s a staggering duality of childish innocence and poetic confidence, as Koenig stages a plaintive confrontation with his higher power, listing its non-believers, and shrugging: “America don’t love you/ So I can never love you in spite of everything.” This isn’t a breakup, but an attempt to see the other side in hopes of reconciliation: why should you show such love for the people who go such lengths to deny your existence, when you can’t even get any credit for it? It’s some heavy ****, the kind of thing more fit for a five-hour dorm-room bull session than a five-minute pop song.
But as with most of Vampire Weekend’s music, the accomplishment lies in their unshakeable artistic confidence allowing them to realize ambitions that most bands would be too humble or meek to even consider— the scrambled, mutated voices on the hook play off the inpronounceable name of the lord while flipping the title of perhaps the most beloved pop song of the past two decades. Such is the scope of “Ya Hey,” but Vampire Weekend put it within the grasp of anyone who wants it with another impossibly catchy song that skips along while carrying the weight of the universe.
|
|
|
|