By 2013, the “Indie Sleaze” scene that had propelled Vampire Weekend to the top was being washed away with the social media boom. Yet, in its place, their album that year, Modern Vampires of the City, also served as a launch pad for a new one: the Gen Z Tumblr generation. While the band still appealed to their original fan base, many Gen Z kids heading into their teenage years were discovering them as they were shaping their own Tumblr era aesthetic.What bloghouse and Myspace were to millennials, a younger crowd leaned into a love for grunge vibes — reblogging pictures of leather jackets, fishnet leggings, and edits of emo quotes, typically by rising alt stars like Lorde and Sky Ferreira, and veterans Arctic Monkeys. (Two of whom also had black-and-white-themed albums that were released the same year.)Read more: The Strokes albums ranked: From worst to bestAnd Vampire Weekend was changing, too. Initially formed on the grounds of Columbia University when all the members were in their early-20s, they were now cemented into adulthood and, with that, a different musical mindset. “There’s always something kind of haunting about the phrase ‘Modern Vampires of the City.’ And at first there was something that
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Modern Vampires of the City at 10: How Vampire Weekend spoke to the Gen Z Tumblr generation
