Vampire Weekend
Alexandra Palace, London
03/12/2010

Climbing the treacherously icy steps up to Alexandra Palace on this bitterly cold evening might not be ideal preparation for Vampire Weekend’s warm blend of Afro-pop rhythms and sunshine melodies but the enticing New York jangle of Ezra Koenig and co is possibly just what London needs to melt the cold Winter snap.

Indeed, the atmosphere inside the venue is one of festival fun (and drunkenness) as Vampire Weekend take to the stage and immediately dive head long into their enviable collection of hits. This year’s album ‘Contra’ has not set the world alight in the way that their self-titled debut did but nonetheless is pillaged for a number of tonight’s biggest sing alongs including ‘Cousins’ and the precise, jittering beat of ‘Giving Up The Gun’. Unfortunately, a live airing of ‘Contra’ also brings with it some low tempo lulls in proceedings with ‘I Think Ur A Contra’ hitting the proverbial bum note. It’s not that Vampire Weekend’s slower material doesn’t work, but in amongst the high octane, sugar rush of tracks such as ‘One’ and ‘Holiday’ anything not on a frantic setting seems dull in comparison.

When the New York four piece hit their stride, however, there are few bands to rival them in the fun stakes. Like a more scholared Supergrass, each song that bursts across this stately hall is fired back at the band by a chorus line of merriment. Nobody in the room gives a fuck about an ‘Oxford Comma’ and even less might know the origins of ‘Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa’ but that matters little when the lines dance merrily above the smiling faces gathered here this evening. Like a spot of gardening or a splash around in an outdoor swimming pool, Vampire Weekend need the sun to reach optimum levels of enjoyment, perhaps. But for a band who engage the brain as much as the feet – there are very few acts like them. Let’s just hope that the next time London sees them, we can provide the rays they so richly deserve.

David Renshaw