so the answer's 'no', then?
“I was pretty charmed with Vampire Weekend’s debut, but I was also charmed by the way that some people who hated it didn’t just dislike the music: some of them objected, viscerally, to the very idea that indie bands would even be like that”
or that people would like indie bands like that. not that I think there’s anything much revolutionary about Vampire Weekend, but I don’t think they’re ‘bland, insipid pop tripe’ either (which, by the way fleetfootedfox, makes me want to make a joke about offal music).
I guess I should clarify about the ‘top 20’ part (P4K put it at #51, incidentally); I’ve only been actively keeping up with current music for a couple of years this decade, so while a) there’s an obvious bias towards recent bands, b) I’m familiar enough with most of the major indie albums from previous years, and I don’t really feel the need to listen to any of them. Mclusky Do Dallas is the only mildly critically successful album from 2000-2006 that’s become part of my listening habits, and it’s arguably close to being a bona fide punk rock album. so far, this just means adjusting the numbers for those emotionally invested in the first wave of 00s rock, so top 20 becomes 40 or 50 (and if you actually like indie rock, rather than enjoying it on sufferance like me, you can expand it to 100 to cover all the strands and subgenres). bingo, I’m consistent with Pitchfork.
that leaves mostly just the forces of reaction/boredom. fair enough if you just don’t like it, no-one’s forcing you to. it’s not like this is real pop music, after all. which is what makes unbornwhiskey’s “Nowhere near my top anything, but it is a fun record” such a curious answer - is there no room in your ‘top anything’ for a fun record, or is music all serious? I’m not sure how much more than a fun record Vampire Weekend actually is, although I’d argue that it is something more. hence I’d be in favour of whitneymcn’s response, except that the album is such a personal favourite of mine. and thus, in a personal best-of, it ranks highly. I won’t make any other claims.
