With their last release coming out in 2013, Vampire Weekend have been pretty quiet recently while the group’s members have each been working on solo projects or different collaborations. Vampire Weekend’s bassist, Chris Baio, put out his debut solo album under the name BAIO, and now producer, arranger, and songwriter Rostam Batmanglij has announced his departure from the group entirely. Batmanglij is a founding member of Vampire Weekend and helped form the group with singer Ezra Koenig while the pair were in college together at Columbia University.
Rostam released his first solo track, “EOS,” last week, and now he’s followed it up with a statement on Twitter announcing his departure from the band. In the short note on social media, he mentions that he is no longer a member of Vampire Weekend, but will continue to collaborate with Ezra on future songs for the group. Batmanglij has worked on a number of non-Vampire Weekend projects the past few years, including co-writing and producing a track on Carly Rae Jepsen’s latest album, E•MO•TION.
As a fundamental element of Vampire Weekend’s songwriting along with singer Ezra Koenig on multiple critically acclaimed albums, his leaving could change the band in a quite significant way. Take a look at Rostam’s farewell note below:
— Rostam (@matsoR) January 26, 2016
