It turned out that Wednesday night was Ska Night at the Hollywood Bowl.
That's how Ezra Koenig described Vampire Weekend's latest visit to the iconic venue in Cahuenga Pass, where he and his bandmates arrived this week shortly after a world tour behind their fifth studio album, “Only God Was Above Us.” . In truth, the LP has less to do with that venerable Jamaican style than any of Vampire Weekend's other albums; Ska, at this point, is just “one of the 17 secret ingredients of our proprietary sound,” as Koenig put it onstage.
But it was in keeping with “Only God’s” deep thoughts on story, and with Vampire Weekend’s broader world-building instinct, to organize this sold-out show around a strong concept with ties to the early days of the series. band. Thus, a couple of long-running ska groups in Riverside's English Beat and Voodoo Glow Skulls opening for them, as well as a handful of older songs that Vampire Weekend “ska-ified,” to use Koenig's term, over the course of its two set time.
“Sunflower” was lean and stringy, “Ottoman” slightly manic in its propulsion, “Giving Up the Gun” was probably the band's most compelling remake, alternating between lively verses and a dizzying double-time chorus that would have made Operation Ivy proud. . Did Koenig, 40, deliver these tunes, in the style of a time-tested ska revival, with goofy alternative titles like “Skaflower” and, uh, “Skattoman”? Unfortunately, he did. But you had to appreciate the thoroughness of his vision.
Indeed, this revisiting of familiar material showed just how adept a live band Vampire Weekend have become in the last five years. When they left Columbia University in New York in the mid-2000s, Koenig and the group's other members—bassist Chris Baio, drummer Chris Tomson, and multi-instrumentalist Rostam Batmanglij (who has since quit)—seemed charming but hesitant studio rats whose blog era's fusion of indie rock, ska and African pop worked ingeniously on record, but lacked power and finesse on stage.
Chris Baio, right, performs Wednesday.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)
Now based in Los Angeles, Vampire Weekend in its seven-piece live incarnation (including a saxophonist and a second drummer) play these days like a seasoned jam band: funky, dexterous, eager to hit a beat somewhere but never so far from Koenig. well-sculpted melodies that anyone runs the risk of getting bored.
During “Classical” from the new album, the group's saxophonist Colin Killalea performed a wild solo while a stagehand dressed in a high-visibility road worker suit took off his orange vest and did a dance routine in the middle of the stage.
Like Vampire Weekend's past albums, “Only God Was Above Us” was recorded with painstaking precision by Koenig and producer Ariel Rechtshaid, who showed up Wednesday to join the band for “Capricorn” and “Gen-X Cops.” . (Most importantly, Rechtshaid started out in a Los Angeles ska band called Hippos before working with artists like Madonna, Usher and Haim.) Its loud cacophony evokes a sense of chaos that's barely held in place: a meditation from afar in the band's hometown of New York, perhaps, or a riff on the messiness of parenthood after Koenig had a son with his romantic partner, actress Rashida Jones.
However, “Only God” only really came to life at the Bowl, with the song's stinging guitar licks and rolling piano lines clashing beautifully against each other beneath the still-youthful yearning in Koenig's voice.
Chris Tomson on drums.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)
Beyond the new material and the old ska songs, Vampire Weekend offered an energetic “Cousins”, a dreamy “Hannah Hunt” and a vibrant “Harmony Hall” with welcome echoes of classic acid house. For an encore, the band played a song Koenig wrote for Tim Robinson's Netflix comedy show, “I Think You Should Leave” (Robinson himself ran out onstage to wave awkwardly) before accepting audience requests: “Peg” by Steely Dan. ,” which Koenig interrupted after confessing that he needed backing vocals from Michael McDonald, the Grateful Dead’s “Touch of Grey,” and the B-52s’ “Rock Lobster.”
After that, Koenig told the crowd that he was fighting the Bowl's 11 p.m. curfew and had to move on to “Walcott,” which he called Vampire Weekend's “traditional send-off song.” But one got the feeling that, for him, the fun of the requests – the fun of the challenge – had only just begun.
