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The old five-point scale has been retired in favor of just rating stuff 1-10, which allows me a much more nuanced final rating. Still don't take it that seriously. Most of these come from my own collection, so the grades skew rather high. Your results may vary if you send me stuff to review.

Each album is given three Essential tracks, my personal favorites, regardless of how weird and inconsequential they are. The Quintessential pick is the one I think best represents the album as a whole, so you can try one song instead of a whole album of songs. Non-Essential picks range from merely disappointing to outright unlistenable.

Vampire Weekend

[#] Contra (2010)

Reviewed August 18, 2020

Her face will be yours as you listen.

(This is an album that was previously covered on the Rediscovering! Click the link in the table to read a wordier and possibly less accurate version of my feelings on this album.)

The year is 2010, and through a selection of music videos on TeenNick in between episodes of Saved By the Bell, a prepubescent Cammy is exposed to the music of Vampire Weekend for the first time. The music video for "Cousins" remains one of my favorites ever made, and the song ain't half bad either, an energetic, two minute, tidy indie rock song with big Adderall energy. Not much on Contra matches its jitters ("California English" comes real close, though, and maybe outdoes it in spikiness), but if you liked the cut of the band's weirdness, the wordy English major lyrics, and their way around a hook, its parent album has a lot to love.

I didn't know how to feel about Contra for a good many listens. 80s synths bubble and percolate, the rhythms have a walking, forward propulsion to them, even on the slower cuts, and singer Ezra Koenig yelps and mumbles in his forever-curious accent about, mostly, what happens when high-minded ideals and modern art culture clash with the darker side of relationships. What keeps such auteurism together is that Vampire Weekend is a pop band, and every hyperliterate verse is matched with weirdly loopy, hooky howling ("White Sky"), an excellent singalong chorus ("Giving Up the Gun"), or just plain fun, nervy energy. Contra is a freaky grower of an indie pop record, but thankfully, its neat length and the strength of its wonderfully-catchy singles seriously aid in digestion. Very nice.

Essential:	Quintessential:	Non-Essential:	Rating:
"White Sky", "Cousins", "California English"	"Holiday"	"Horchata"
Contra's Rediscovering entry

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