The album was co-produced by Batmanglij and Ariel Rechtshaid.

The bands eponymous first album Vampire Weekend (2008)which included the singles Mansard Roof, A-Punk, Oxford Comma, Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa, and The Kids Dont Stand a Chance was acclaimed by critics for its world music influences.

Their following album, Contra (2010), was similarly acclaimed and garnered strong commercial success.

Their third studio album, Modern Vampires of the City (2013), won the group the Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album.

The bands fourth album, Father of the Bride, was released in 2019, and earned them a second Grammy win for Best Alternative Music Album.

The album was also nominated for the Grammy Award for Album of the Year.

Koenig toured with The Dirty Projectors during a period of experimentation with African music, inspiring the band to incorporate world sounds into their earliest work.

The band chose the name Vampire Weekend from the title of a short film project Koenig worked on during the summer between freshman and sophomore years in college.

While home for the summer, Koenig watched the 1987 vampire film The Lost Boys and was inspired to make a Northeastern version of the film in which a man named Walcott travels to Cape Cod to warn the mayor that vampires are attacking the United States.

Koenig abandoned the project after two days.

The band began playing shows around Columbia University, starting with a battle of the bands at Lerner Hall in 2006.

After graduating from college, the band self-produced their debut album while simultaneously working full-time jobs, Tomson as a music archivist and Koenig as a middle school English teacher.

The then-nascent influence of blog hype and internet buzz played a role in their success and led to a large prerelease following sufficient to support them performing on three tours before their debut album was released.

They were declared The Years Best New Band by Spin magazine in the March 2008 issue, and were the first band to be shot for the cover of the magazine before releasing their debut album.

The band made a television appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman on February 1, 2008, 21 and on March 8, 2008, performed on Saturday Night Live.

Four songs from the bands first album also made the Triple J Hottest 100, 2008.

The internet hype had its backlash, however, as critics reacted against a perceived image of Vampire Weekend as privileged, upper-class Ivy League graduates stealing from foreign musicians.

One critic went so far as to call Vampire Weekend the whitest band in the world, to which they took exception, given their Ukrainian, Persian, Italian, and Hungarian heritages.

Koenig responded in a November 2009 interview by saying, Nobody in our band is a WASP.

Furthermore, the backlash involving their social backgrounds was largely unfounded, as Koenig explained in the interview that the band members got into Columbia on scholarship and used student loans; he himself was still paying off student loans in 2009.

Vampire Weekend (20072009).

A success in the US and UK, it peaked at number 15 on the UK Albums Chart and number 17 on the Billboard 200.

Four singles were released from the album; while A-Punk peaked at number 25 on the Billboard Modern rock chart and number 55 on the UK Singles Chart, Oxford Comma peaked at number 38 in the UK.

A-Punk was ranked the 4th on Rolling Stones Readers Rock List: Best Songs of 2008.

A-Punk was also used to open the Will FerrellJohn C.

Reilly feature Step Brothers, and featured in the UK television show The Inbetweeners and the video games Guitar Hero 5, Just Dance 2 and Lego Rock Band.

The albums second single, Cousins, was released as a single on November 17, 2009.

Initial copies of the CD and LP sold at independent record stores in the US included a 3-track bonus CD containing two melts, which featured bits of album tracks and a remix.

The following month, the band toured Europe and Canada with Canadian electro duo Fan Death as their support.

The video for their next single Giving Up the Gun was also released on February 18, 2010 which included cameos from Joe Jonas, Lil Jon, RZA, and Jake Gyllenhaal.

The band were also on the main stage at T in the Park 2010 at Balado Kinross, Scotland, on June 8, and played the Oxegen Festival in Ireland on July 9.

They also headlined the Latitude Festival in Suffolk, UK on July 18.

In the summer of 2010 the band played at the Utopia stage on Peace and Love, Swedens biggest Festival.

On July 30, 2010, the band played at Jisan Valley Rock Festival in South Korea.

The tour started off on August 27, 2010, in Vancouver, British Columbia at the Malkin Bowl.

Koenig mentioned to the audience that before this concert, the band had the longest vacation period that they had had in a while.

On April 26, 2012, Rolling Stone reported that the new album could be released by the end of the year.

It would be cool if it was released this year.We just never want to be in a position where when we put out something, we feel couldve benefited from more time.

Until its release, the band was discreet about the details of the next album, stating that a band can give a bunch of interviews when theyre working on stuff but they dont want something they said six months ago to influence how people hear it when its done.

Vampire Weekend Members