Vampire Weekend returned from a five-year hiatus this with both new music (in the form of singles “Capricorn” and “Gen-X Cops”) and a new tour for their album Only God Was Above Us. Ezra and the gang will be on the road from early April to mid-August with a variety of different openers, some of whom you know and some might be new to you. Here is who is opening the Only God Was Above Us tour.
LA LOM
LA LOM stands for The Los Angeles League Of Musicians, an instrumental trio who play a blend of Cumbia, Afro Cuban Jazz, and Americana. It’s clear that LA LOM’s approach to classical Latin music is very similar to Vampire Weekend’s stylistic experimentation.
The English Beat
Just as their name suggests The Beat are a British band, which was formed in 1978, blending influences of Latin, pop, punk, reggae, ska, and soul (sorta like contemporaries The Police). You could think of them as kind of a precursor for some of Vampire Weekend’s music.
Voodoo Glow Skull
Riverside ska punk band Voodoo Glow Skull was formed in 1988 in Riverside, California, and has played alongside legendary groups like The Mighty Mighty Bosstones and Murphy’s Law.
Mike Gordon
Best known as the bassist of Phish, Mike’s also had a fairly productive solo career, with six solo albums, including 2023’s Flying Games.
Christone “Kingfish” Ingram
A blues guitarist and singer from Clarksdale, Mississippi, Kingfish has been keeping the genre alive and infusing it with the youth that it’s sorely needed at just 25 years old.
Ra Ra Riot
Hailing from Syracuse, New York, indie rock band Ra Ra Riot includes a violinist and generated plenty of buzz back in those indie sleaze days which were pretty much headlined by Vampire Weekend. Their last album, Superbloom, was released in 2019.
Princess
Not gonna lie: My personal fave from this roster. Princess is a Prince cover band fronted by comedian Maya Rudolph and her friend, singer Gretchen Lieberum. Their shows are always a good time, because despite their comedic bent, they take their love for the Purple One very seriously — and remind listeners how much they love him, too.
Cults
Another New York indie rock band like Vampire Weekend, they also rose to prominence during the indie breakout era in the late naughts/early teens. In 2020, they dropped their most recent album, Host.
Mark Ronson
A man who needs no introduction, Ronson has been the producer on a ton of artists’ breakout hits, including Amy Winehouse and Bruno Mars. The Grammy Award winner has also been prolific as a solo artist and as one-half of super duo Silk City with Diplo.
Turnstiles
No, that’s not a typo — but you’d be forgiven for thinking it was. I was thrown at first too, but no, this isn’t the hardcore punk band from Baltimore. Instead, it’s “The Ultimate Tribute to the Music of Billy Joel,” from Boynton Beach, Florida.
The Brothers Macklovitch
A fun duo of actual brothers: DJ A-Trak and Dave 1 of Chromeo. They dropped their debut single as a group, “Give Love To Get Love,” on Fool’s Gold in 2020, following up with “I Can Call You” a few months later but have been fairly quiet on the group front since, although they’ve played a number of DJ sets semi-annually on A-Trak’s YouTube ever since.
