In the lead-up to Vampire Weekend’s upcoming album Father Of The Bride, the band has started a monthly double singles series, sharing two new tracks from the record once every few weeks. The record is about a month away now, and the band has shared the final pair of pre-album singles: “This Life” and “Unbearably White.”
“This Life” is a breezy Van Morrison-like track, but with more of Vampire Weekend’s signature pep. The chorus — “You’ve been cheating on, cheating on me/ So I’ve been cheating on, cheating on you” — is borrowed from iLoveMakonnen’s “Tonight,” and he received a writing credit on the song (and so did Mark Ronson).
Meanwhile, “Unbearably White” is a more soulful, R&B-influenced number. Koenig previously said the song is about why “infighting among white people about who is marginally more or less white is not particularly interesting.” As for the song’s title, it appears to be a reference to a 2015 post from The New Republic, which is titled “Why ‘Indie’ Music Is So Unbearably White” and is led by a photo of Koenig. If not that specifically, it’s presumably at least addressing other articles and conversations from around the same time that share a similar sentiment.
When Koenig teased this, the final two-song release preceding Father Of The Bride, he admitted that he has feelings about this monthly tradition coming to an end, writing, “Bittersweet dropping the last drop. I kinda love this two songs at a time thing but ultimately it’s meant to be heard as an album. FATHER OF THE BRIDE. get ready.”
Listen to “This Life” and “Unbearably White” above.
Father Of The Bride is out 5/03 via Columbia. Pre-order it here.
