Rostam Goes Deep on Vampire Weekend’s Contra on 7th Anniversary of Leak

Rostam Goes Deep on Vampire Weekend’s Contra on 7th Anniversary of Leak

Seven years ago, Vampire Weekend’s sophomore album Contra leaked onto the internet. To celebrate the occasion, former band member Rostam, who produced the record, conducted an AMA on Twitter to answer fans’ questions about the LP. During the extensive Q&A, Rostam goes into detail about his inspirations (including M.I.A., Bach, and Chopin), the album cover, and the outtakes. He also reveals that they did a version of “Hannah Hunt”—a highlight from 2013’s Modern Vampires of the City—during the Contra sessions, and that “it sounded kinda like… Nelly Furtado.” See some of his tweets below.

After leaving Vampire Weekend early last year, Rostam released the solo tracks “EOS” and “Gravity Don’t Pull Me.” He also collaborated with Hamilton Leithauser for the excellent I Had a Dream That You Were Mine. Recently, he scored Netflix’s “The OA”—a new sci-fi/drama series co-written by his brother Zal.

Read our interview “Rostam’s Next-Level Art Music.”

b4 contra came out i’d play it for friends & I always played it in reverse order because the last three songs were the ones I loved the most

— Rostam Batmanglij (@matsoR) January 6, 2017

@Nickbellitti that’s a super good question, i think we felt like contra was going to be a little more electronic generally and it fit more

— Rostam Batmanglij (@matsoR) January 6, 2017

@cmholub haven’t listened in a really long time… but prolly the titular

— Rostam Batmanglij (@matsoR) January 6, 2017

@CubistPepe it was from b4 but we did a version that we never finished during contra & it sounded kinda like ‘say it right’ by Nelly Furtado

— Rostam Batmanglij (@matsoR) January 6, 2017

@andreyazizov I searched New York City 1983 on Flickr , and that picture came up

— Rostam Batmanglij (@matsoR) January 6, 2017

@mswxn it was after the record finished and printed, I would’ve loved for it to be on

— Rostam Batmanglij (@matsoR) January 6, 2017

@alex_cimmino it was my last show and I had always wanted to perform that song

— Rostam Batmanglij (@matsoR) January 6, 2017

@hannadoortea because I loved kala, i was trying to make contra sound like kala but performed by a band

— Rostam Batmanglij (@matsoR) January 6, 2017

@beIIjar I thought it would be really cool to try to make an album that had 80s vibes but not the same 80s vibe that everyone else was doing

— Rostam Batmanglij (@matsoR) January 6, 2017

Watch Vampire Weekend perform “Horchata” for Pitchfork.tv:

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