Rostam brought a full band to Fortune Sound Club
Vampire Weekend's founder played a tight, intimate set for a half-full room, leaning on his country-tinged new album.
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Rostam Batmanglij walked into Fortune Sound Club with five musicians and a catalogue most artists would envy. As a founding member of Vampire Weekend, half of the duo Discovery, and producer for Haim and Clairo, he's built one of the most distinctive and layered discographies in indie music. His 2016 collaboration with Hamilton Leithauser, "I Had a Dream That You Were Mine," became the wedding album of the decade—if you've been to a wedding in the last ten years without hearing it, you were unlucky.
Monday night, the room was around half full. Rostam apparently considered cancelling his Vancouver date, as he had with other shows, because "I can't replicate the album with other musicians and can't bring justice to the music." But he didn't cancel. Instead, he brought those five musicians—all playing multiple instruments, all at the top of their craft—and gave the small crowd something tight and composed.
The set leaned on his new album "American Stories," which he described to a border agent as "a kind of folk" and which he admitted is more country-heavy than his earlier work. For longtime listeners, the highlights were older material: "In a River," "Gwan," the Vampire Weekend album closer "Young Lion," and an incredibly rousing "Bike Dream" that got the sparse crowd moving in ways you wouldn't have predicted.
His new single with Clairo, "Hardy," was the faux closer—the keyboard player turned around and banged the railing with drumsticks. Rostam asked the crowd if they'd seen him tour "Half Light" nearly a decade ago. Many had. He was surprised it happened at Venue, the old Pearl location.
When he asked what he should know about Vancouver, silence. Then: "We have whales!" (He already knew.) Then: "The California roll was invented here!" (Rostam's response was diplomatic.)
Small crowds mean space to see the musicians work. The set had a nice rhythm of peaks and valleys, though saving "Young Lion" for later in the set rather than the close might have landed harder. For those 200 or so people in the room, it was a close-up master class in how meticulous indie rock is made.