Vampire Weekend – “Sunflower” (Feat. Steve Lacy) & “Big Blue”
Vampire Weekend are rolling out the advance tracks from their new double album two at a time. At the top of this year, Ezra Koenig explained that we were to expect a two-song dispatch once a month until Father Of The Bride sees official release this spring. That began in January with “Harmony Hall” and “2021,” but February’s planned pair of tracks did not materialize. As Koenig told us on Instagram last week, the band “wanted to get it out in February but we were convinced by intelligent people to wait a week to get some ducks in a row.”
So now, a week into March, comes the latest double drop. They’ve also confirmed a 5/3 release date for Father Of The Bride and revealed its official cover art. Viewable above, it lines up with our previous speculation on the matter.
The ostensible A-side of this latest pairing is “Sunflower,” which will soon have a video directed by Jonah Hill at Zabar’s on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. A collaboration with the Internet’s Steve Lacy, it’s billed as “the sibling song” of “Flower Moon,” which Vampire Weekend previewed at a show last summer. The other song out today is “Big Blue,” which got its first airing at a Lollapalooza aftershow last August.
Father Of The Bride is Vampire Weekend’s first album in a whopping six years. Their last release was 2013’s masterful Modern Vampires Of The City. A lot has happened since then, including the departure of founding member Rostam Batmanglij, though he was still involved with the creation of Father Of The Bride.
Hear both new songs below.
On Instagram, Koenig shared background on both new songs. DJ Dahi, who co-produced “Big Blue” along with Koenig and Ariel Rechtshaid, also posted about the tunes. Here’s the text of Koenig’s post:
shout out to @steve.lacy ! He randomly tweeted at me a few years ago saying we should collaborate. He was right ! Sunflower is the first song ever released by VW with a feature and I’m glad it’s Steve. He told me the first song he ever learned on guitar was A-Punk which is hilarious cuz he is now way better at guitar than me. Can’t waif for you to hear his other contributions to FOTB. Also shout out to @djdahi – another album collaborator. He co-produced Big Blue. (This pic is from the set of the Sunflower video directed by @jonahhill – coming soon.)
And here are his and Dahi’s posts:
Father Of The Bride is out 5/3 on Columbia. Pre-order it here.
