Vampire Weekend Return With 2 New Tracks, North American Tour Feat. St. Augustine Stop

Indie-rock institution Vampire Weekend will soon return with their first new album in five years, Only God Was Above Us (April 5, Columbia Records), and to hold us over until then, Ezra Koenig, Chris Baio and Chris Tomson have shared two stellar new singles, “Capricorn” and “Gen-X Cops,” and announced a sprawling North American tour that features an October stop in St. Augustine.

Our first preview of Only God Was Above Us is a promising one: “Capricorn” and “Gen-X Cops” are each melodic and mercurial in their own unique ways, the work of a rock band that continues to evolve long after many of their early-aughts peers have fallen off. On the A-side is “Capricorn”—written by Koenig, who co-produced alongside Ariel Rechtstaid—a warm acoustic strummer, at least at first, about finding one’s place amid the infinite vastness of space and time, or “Sifting through centuries / For moments of your own,” as Koenig puts it. Ambling drums and bass, piano arpeggios and steady strings are suddenly joined by heavily distorted guitar squalls and synth flickers, as if to emphasize how little we know about what’s coming around the next existential corner.

“Gen-X Cops,” on the other hand—co-written by Koenig and Tomson, and produced by Rechtstaid, Koenig and Tomson—explodes out of the starting gate, with a crackling electric guitar riff that goes for the jugular like little in Vampire Weekend’s discography. Tomson’s racing drums maintain the track’s twitchy energy as Koenig laments a world in which many “Dodged the draft but can’t dodge the war / Forever cursed to live insecure.” The track dwells on the grand disconnections between people, depicting disparate generations like ill-fitting puzzle pieces, unwilling or unable to change their shapes. “Each generation makes its own apology,” goes the refrain, in either resignation or acceptance—maybe both.

Both “Capricorn” and “Gen-X Cops” are accompanied by music videos—directed by longtime Vampire Weekend creative director Nick Harwood and The Fall Guy, Hotel Artemis and Iron Man 3 filmmaker Drew Pearce, respectively—composed of footage shot in late-’80s New York City by photographer Steven Siegel, who also lensed the Only God Was Above Us album art.

Vampire Weekend’s North American headlining tour, produced by Live Nation, is a 39-show run that kicks off in June, following a handful of previously announced festival headlining sets (plus a sold-out Austin show beneath a solar eclipse!) in April and May. The tour features unique two-show engagements in Berkeley, California, Bonner, Montana, and New York City, where the band will play Saturday night shows followed by Sunday morning matinee sets. Their stop at the St. Augustine Amphitheatre on Tuesday, Oct. 15, is the penultimate show on the tour as it currently stands. Presales start Wednesday, Feb. 21, at 10 a.m. local time, with general on-sale to follow on Friday, Feb. 23, at the same time.

Vampire Weekend Only God Was Above Us Tour Dates:

Mon Apr 08 – Austin, TX – Moody Amphitheater (Solar Eclipse) –  SOLD OUT 

Sat April 27 – New Orleans, LA – New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival*

Fri May 10 – Salt Lake City, UT – Kilby Block Party*

Thu May 30 – Barcelona, Espana – Primavera Sound*

Thu Jun 06 – Houston, TX – 713 Music Hall

Fri Jun 07 – Irving, TX – The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory

Sun Jun 09 – Phoenix, AZ – Arizona Financial Theatre

Mon Jun 10 – San Diego, CA – Cal Coast Credit Union Open Air Theatre

Wed Jun 12 – Los Angeles, CA – Hollywood Bowl

Sat Jun 15 – Berkeley, CA – The Greek Theatre at U.C. Berkeley

Sun Jun 16 – Berkeley, CA – The Greek Theatre at U.C. Berkeley (Matinee Show)

Tue Jun 18 – Burnaby, BC – Deer Lake Park

Wed Jun 19 – Bend, OR – Hayden Homes Amphitheater

Thu Jun 20 – Seattle, WA – Climate Pledge Arena

Sat Jun 22 – Bonner, MT – KettleHouse Amphitheater

Sun Jun 23 – Bonner, MT – KettleHouse Amphitheater (Matinee Show)

Fri Jul 19 – Morrison, CO – Red Rocks Amphitheatre

Mon Jul 22 – Kansas City, MO – Starlight Theatre

Tue Jul 23 – Lincoln, NE – Pinewood Bowl Theater

Thu Jul 25 – Maryland Heights, MO – Saint Louis Music Park

Fri Jul 26 – Chicago, IL – Huntington Bank Pavilion at Northerly Island

Sat Jul 27 – Chicago, IL – Huntington Bank Pavilion at Northerly Island

Tue Jul 30 – Minneapolis, MN – The Armory

Thu Aug 01 – Milwaukee, WI – BMO Pavilion

Sat Aug 3 – St. Charles, IA – Hinterland*

Thu Sep 19 – Cuyahoga Falls, OH – Blossom Music Center

Fri Sep 20 – Cincinnati, OH – The ICON Festival Stage at Smale Park

Sat Sep 21 – Indianapolis, IN – Everwise Amphitheater at White River State Park

Mon Sep 23 – Rochester Hills, MI – Meadow Brook Amphitheatre

Tue Sep 24 – Toronto, ON – Budweiser Stage

Wed Sep 25 – Laval, QC – Place Bell

Fri Sep 27 – Boston, MA – TD Garden

Sat Sep 28 – Philadelphia, PA – TD Pavilion at The Mann

Mon Sep 30 – Washington, DC – The Anthem

Wed Oct 02 – Charlottesville, VA – Ting Pavilion

Sat Oct 05 – New York, NY – Madison Square Garden

Sun Oct 06 – New York, NY – Madison Square Garden (Matinee Show)

Tue Oct 08 – Wilmington, NC – Live Oak Bank Pavilion

Wed Oct 09 – Raleigh, NC – Red Hat Amphitheater

Fri Oct 11 – Nashville, TN – Ascend Amphitheater

Sat Oct 12 – Atlanta, GA – Cadence Bank Amphitheatre at Chastain Park

Sun Oct 13 – Asheville, NC – Rabbit Rabbit

Tue Oct 15 – St. Augustine, FL – St. Augustine Amphitheatre

Thu Oct 17 – Austin, TX – Moody Center

*Festival date