This past month, well known American Indie rock band, Vampire Weekend came out with their fourth studio album titled Father of the Bride.

Released on May 3, 2019 the album quickly reached billboard’s number 1 album on the charts. Fans were thrilled to see the return of lead singer Ezra Koenig. His unique voice and rich song writing stills excited fans most after taking a 6 year break since their release of their previous album, Modern Vampires of the City. The band has a very unique style and fuse pop and baroque instrumentation into a fun, distinctive sound. The guitar work and solos shine in this album and bring a fun but soothing tune to each track.

“Big Blue,” one of the first few songs on the record, brings out big jazz vibes, has a great tune but some awkwardly placed vocals. The introductory verse seems to be forgotten about once the track explodes into flowery harmonies and detuned guitar licks.

“This Life,” a folk flavored pop track, is a fun song that will leave you rocking out. This song definitely has an older vibe. “Spring Snow” has some bad vocals backed up by a repeditiative drumming sound that lacks intensity. “Rich man,” another song on his album, is calmer but seems to be forced which is somewhat distracting by the powerful string instrumentation half way through the track. “My Mistake” is a beautiful yet sad piano jazz song, while “Sympathy,” an acoustic rock rager, brings excitement and strength to the album. Additionally, Danielle Haim is featured in three tracks which brings amazing vocal chemistry and very solid songs.

“Harmony Hall” is an amazing single that came out before the release of the album. It is the best song on the album and the catchy beat and poetic lyrics, “I don’t wanna live like this but I don’t wanna die,” are extremely relatable. This song will make you feel all types of ways.

The band is well known for their distinct voice but also their mix of sounds and styles. At 18 tracks, the album has a long running time of about an hour.  The first half of the songs are extremely rich while towards the end, they start to drag on and seem to be stuck to add quantity to the album. Quantity or quality seemed to be a bit of an issue on this album but there are definitely a number of tracks that are great and worth listening to.