Detailed Textual Analysis

Click Here For The Kooks Shine On Video

Genre Characteristics
The genre of this song is indie pop. When I think of indie videos a band playing instruments always comes to mine. This video highlights the band and their instruments conforming to this characteristic. Another characteristic is the way that they present themselves, I expect indie bands to be wearing skinny jeans and just a plain top, and this is exactly what is presented in most of The Kooks video.

What is the relationship between music and visuals?
The music video is a performance video so there is no relationship between the video and music.

Are the close-ups of the artist and star image motifs?
During the video there are many close ups of the band as you would expect with a performance video. These persist throughout the video.

Is there any reference to the notion of looking?
There is a wide reference to the notion of looking as the close up shows the artists to be looking straight into the camera which feels as if the band is connecting to the audience.

Brief Textual Analysis - Two Indie Videos

For my textual analysis I am going to look at two different bands music videos from the indie genre.

The Fratellis - Chelsea Dagger
The Fratellis hit song Chelsea Dagger is a very fast up beat song that has a catchy tune to it.


The video starts of with a lady wearing patent black heels. This creates a sense of promiscuous behavior as she is showing a lot of leg and this is all that the camera has focused on.







It then cuts on to the drummer of the band who is quite clearly playing the drums, this shows me that the music video could be a band performance






The video then cuts to the band appearing one after each-other to the beat of the song.







The video then follows on to burlesque girls dancing to that song, with happy emotions on their faces. This creates a happy and promiscuous atmosphere. It also shows the sexual appeal that women have towards men through the skimpy outfits that they wear. The video represents some very promiscuous shots of the women, wearing corsets and stockings. This gives men a sense of sex appeal, and happiness.





This is a performance based video. The video cuts from the band to the burlesque girls until they join together. When they join together the girls are dancing doing the cancan whilst the band sings around them.




Vampire Weekend - Cousins
In my opinion i think that this video is quite iconic for this up beat song. This is because Vampire Weekend use the idea of tracking back and forth throughout the video without changing scenery. The only thing that Vampire Weekend change in their video is what they are doing.


This is the scenery that is used throughout the whole of the video. However, the directing in which they travel down changes, sometimes they're traveling backwards and sometimes they travel forwards. However they do not travel sideways.





When the song is playing and the lead singer is tracking, the other band members are seen on the left hand side playing their instruments.




This video has some imperfect cuts, usually this would make a video look cheap and rubbish. However for Vampire Weekend it helps to build and iconic video. During the chorus there is a cut when the main singer in singing with people walking past in the background. After this there is another cut of the lead singer in the same position however in the background there is no one walking past.

The Kooks - Appealing To The Audience

In my music video I intend to appeal to my target audience by the way that I dress the cast, the way I design the bedroom that will be in my music video, and through the props that I intend to use.

I intend to keep everything simple as I do not want to over complicate anything.

The Kooks - Other Artists

I have been researching the different artists that will appeal to the target audience of The Kooks.

The Fratellis
The Fratellis are an indie rock band from Glasgow, Scotland. The band consists of lead vocalist and guitarist Jon Fratelli (born John Lawler), bass guitarist Barry Fratelli (born Barry Wallace), and drummer, backing vocalist, occasional guitarist and banjo player Mince Fratelli (born Gordon McRory). During live shows, they are assisted by pianist/rhythm guitarist, Will Foster. The group's debut album Costello Music was released on 26 September 2006 and debuted at a high #2 on the UK Album Charts and was also successful in the United States peaking at #48 on the Billboard 200.[3]. The album contained 2 UK Top 10 singles "Chelsea Dagger" and "Whistle for the Choir" It also contained 2 UK Top 40 hits "Henrietta" and "Baby Fratelli". It produced other singles such as "Flathead" that made #67 on the UK Singles Charts and #73 on the Billboard Hot 100 which became a hit after featuring in an iPod commercial.

Vampire Weekend
Vampire Weekend are an American indie rock band from New York City that formed in 2006 and signed to XL Recordings. The Band has four members: Ezra Koenig, Rostam Batmanglij, Chris Tomson, and Chris Baio. The band released its first album Vampire Weekend in 2008, which produced the singles "Mansard Roof", "A-Punk", "Oxford Comma", and "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa". The band's most recent album, Contra, was released in 2010.

Arctic Monkeys
Arctic Monkeys are an English Indie rock band. Formed in 2002 in High Green, a suburb of Sheffield, the band currently consists of Alex Turner (lead vocals, lead guitar), Jamie Cook (rhythm guitar, backing vocals), Nick O'Malley (bass guitar, backing vocals), Matt Helders (drums, percussion, backing vocals) and John Ashton as a touring member (keyboard, guitar, backing vocals). Former members include Andy Nicholson (bass guitar, backing vocals) and Glyn Jones (lead vocals, rhythm guitar).

The Kooks - Target Audience

A target audience is a specific group of people within a target market. A target audience can be people of a certain age group, gender, marital status. In this case it is gender and age. A certain combination, like men from twenty to thirty is often a target audience. Other groups, although not the main focus may also be interested. For a music company, discovering the target market is espcially important, this is because they will have to decide what channels to put the music on, what time to put the music etc.

The Kooks target audience is 16-30. This is because I feel that they relate to a wide range of people. The Kooks are more targeted at Indie consumers of both sexes.
Due to The Kooks being aware of their target audience they will have the knowledge of where to advertise their music, what channels to have their music on and what festivals to play at, etc.

Expectations Of The Kooks

Genre
The Kooks music fits comfortably into the 'indie pop' genre. Some typical aspects that would be common to see in their videos is instruments such as guitars and drums etc. Lip syncing is also a common factor in an indie pop video. Many indie pop videos are performance videos although they do have some narrative videos.

Previous Videos
The kooks videos are similar to each other. They're always playing an instrument in their videos and they tend to walk into different scenes. The kooks are always plainly dressed and this reflects in their videos as they never really have any kind of excitement into the videos that they make.

Fan Based Expectations
When i question indie pop fans i asked them what they would expect to see in The Kooks videos. The results i got were;
- The band playing an instrument
- Luke Pritchard lip syncing
- The whole band present

The Kooks

The Kooks are an English indie pop band formed in Brighton, East Sussex, in 2004. Formed by Luke Pritchard (vocals/guitar), Hugh Harris (lead guitar), Paul Garred (drums), and Max Rafferty (bass guitar), the lineup of the band remained constant until 2008 and the departure of Rafferty. Dan Logan was drafted in as a temporary replacement, until Peter Denton joined the band on a permanent basis in October 2008. Early in 2010 Pritchard announced the departure of drummer Paul Garred, due to a nerve problem in his arm.
A self-described "pop" band, their music is primarily influenced by the 1960s British Invasion movement and post-punk revival of the new millennium. With songs described as "catchy as hell", The Kooks have experimented in several genres including rock, Britpop, pop, reggae, and ska, at times being described as "a less severe Arctic Monkeys"
Signed to Virgin Records just three months after forming, The Kooks broke into the musical mainstream with their debut album Inside In/Inside Out (2006). The album was ultimately successful, achieving quadruple platinum status in the UK within a year and also overseas in the form of a platinum certification in Australia and two times platinum in Ireland. The Kooks found themselves entering into mainstream media attention, with the band winning the award for Best UK & Ireland Act at the MTV Europe Music Awards 2006 and picking up a nomination at The Brit Awards for the single "She Moves in Her Own Way. With their follow up Konk (2008) debuting at number one on the UK Albums Chart it recorded first week sales of 65,000, achieving gold status in both the UK and Ireland. The Kooks are currently working on their third studio album.

The Kooks - Shine On

Shine On" is a song by English indie rock band The Kooks and is the second single from their 2008 album Konk. It was released on 7 July 2008. Although debuting at a disapponting #63 in the UK Singles Chart the song has received a lot of airplay becoming a radio hit. The release of "Shine On" has also boosted Konk back into the UK top 40 album chart. Upon the physical release of "Shine On", the single climbed to #25, the band's lowest charting single since "Sofa Song".

The music video was made available on The Kooks official website and Youtube on May 23, 2008. It features the band playing the song in a small room while water is dripping from the ceiling.

On July 3, 2008, The Kooks performed a live session on BBC Radio 1. During Jo Whiley's Live Lounge they played a special version of "Shine On" plus a cover of Coldplay's song "Violet Hill".

The Kooks also played the song live on Graham Norton's TV programme.

Final Song Choice

I have decided that I am going to be working on my own to complete my advanced portfolio. this is because i have full control over the song choice and it also helps me to work to the best of my ability. The song I have chosen to make my video for is The Kooks - Shine On from the album Konk.

Song Choices

Kate Nash – Do Wah Doo – My Best Friend Is You
This is one of my song choices because I thought that if I made a video for it then the video could match the lyrics for example 'well I'll just read a book instead' I could have someone portraying this and sitting down reading a book.

The Kooks – Shine On – Konk
This is one of my song choices because i just like the song. I thought this would be a good thing because I will have to listen to the song over and over again when I come to make my music video.

I Found Out – Pigeon Detectives – Wait For Me
This is one of my song choices because the video is simple, not iconic. I thought it would be good to find a video like this because then I can portray the song without anyone being reminded of the current video when they listen to it.

McFly - Thats The Truth
This is one of my songs because I feel that it's contempoary, I also think it tells a story within the lyrics that I could put a video too. I also feel that this song has various tempos in it, at the begining it has a slow tempo and then within in the chorus it becomes a fast tempo.

The Music Video

A music video or song video is a short video or film that accompanies a piece of music or song. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a marketing device intended to promote the sale of music recordings. Although the origins of music videos date back much further, they came into prominence in the 1980s, when MTV based their format around the medium. Prior to the 80s, these works were described by various terms including "illustrated song", "filmed insert", "promotional (promo) film", "promotional clip" or "film clip".

Music videos use a wide range of styles of film making techniques, including animation, live action filming, documentaries, and non-narrative approaches such as abstract film. Some music videos blend different styles, such as animation and live action. Many music videos do not interpret images from the song's lyrics, making it less literal than expected.

The Gadget Show

In todays media we watched a clip from The Gadget Show where Suzi and Jason had a task to go head to head on directing a music video; Suzi had an unlimited budget and Jason had to keep to a small budget. Jason was given the challenge of making a music video for Har Mar Superstar and Suzi had the well known band Fightstar.

From the show I learn't that you don't need to have a huge budget to be able to make a good music video. I found that the low budget seems to have more character to the video.

There are three different types of styles that Suzi and Jason could choose from, they were;
- Performance - Where you have the band playing and all the filming is based on them. (Suzy chose this style)
- Story - Where you can have some filming that has no relevence to the music at all, or you can have something that tells the story of the song. (Jason chose this style)
- Gimmick - This where the video is wacky and unusual and has no relevance to the music. An example of this is OK Go's videos.

In the end Suzi won with the unlimited budget video.

My Musical Taste; Indie Pop

The Kooks are an English indie pop band formed in Brighton, East Sussex, in 2004. Formed by Luke Pritchard (vocals/guitar), Hugh Harris (lead guitar), Paul Garred (drums), and Max Rafferty (bass guitar), the lineup of the band remained constant until 2008 and the departure of Rafferty. Dan Logan was drafted in as a temporary replacement, until Peter Denton joined the band on a permanent basis in October 2008. Early in 2010 Pritchard announced the departure of drummer Paul Garred, due to a nerve problem in his arm.
A self-described "pop" band, their music is primarily influenced by the 1960s British Invasion movement and post-punk revival of the new millennium. With songs described as "catchy as hell", The Kooks have experimented in several genres including rock, Britpop, pop, reggae, and ska, at times being described as "a less severe Arctic Monkeys"
Signed to Virgin Records just three months after forming, The Kooks broke into the musical mainstream with their debut album Inside In/Inside Out (2006). The album was ultimately successful, achieving quadruple platinum status in the UK within a year and also overseas in the form of a platinum certification in Australia and two times platinum in Ireland. The Kooks found themselves entering into mainstream media attention, with the band winning the award for Best UK & Ireland Act at the MTV Europe Music Awards 2006 and picking up a nomination at The Brit Awards for the single "She Moves in Her Own Way. With their follow up Konk (2008) debuting at number one on the UK Albums Chart it recorded first week sales of 65,000, achieving gold status in both the UK and Ireland. The Kooks are currently working on their third studio album.

The Libertines are an English rock band. Formed in London in 1997 by front men Carl Barât (vocals/lead guitar) and Pete Doherty (vocals/rhythm guitar), the band also includes John Hassall (bass) (although Ed Graves of Evolver and Danny Herman of Audiovisuals were also tried as bassists) and Gary Powell (drums) for most of its recording career. Part of what was described as the garage rock revival of that time, one of the aptly named 'The' bands and spearheading this movement in the UK, the band is centered on the song-writing partnership of Barât and Doherty.
The band gained some notoriety in the early 2000s. Although their mainstream success was initially limited, their profile soon grew, culminating in a #2 single and #1 album in the UK Charts. In December 2004, their self-titled second album was voted the second best album of the year by NME magazine. Both of their full-length LPs were produced by Mick Jones, of the British punk band The Clash.
In spite of their critical success,[ the band's music was often eclipsed by its internal conflicts, often stemming from Doherty's addictions to crack cocaine and heroin, which eventually led to the breakup of the band. Doherty has since stated that the breakup of the band had been due to relationship difficulties between Barât and himself that were not related to his drug addictions. The members of The Libertines went on to form new bands with varying degrees of commercial and critical success.
In August 2010, the four members of The Libertines reunited to play a series of shows, including slots at the 2010 Reading and Leeds Festivals. The reunion shows received a highly positive response from the press.



Biffy Clyro are a Scottish rock band from Ayrshire, comprising Simon Neil (guitar, lead vocals), James Johnston (bass, vocals) and Ben Johnston (drums, vocals). After their first three albums, the band expanded their following significantly with the release of their fourth, Puzzle in 2007. The album went gold in the UK, selling over 100,000 units. Biffy Clyro's popularity was built upon further in 2008 and 2009 with the release of the singles "Mountains" and "That Golden Rule", which both reached the top 10 of the UK singles chart. Their latest album, Only Revolutions, reached #3 in the UK chart and went gold within days of its release in 2009, later going platinum in 2010 and was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize.
Simon Neil is the main singer, though all three band members contribute to vocal duties. The band are known for using complex and interwoven guitar riffs, unusual time signatures and chord sequences and melodies that often change throughout songs, and for their energetic live performances.


Katheryn Elizabeth Hudson (born October 25, 1984), better known by her stage name Katy Perry, is an American singer-songwriter and musician. Perry was born in Santa Barbara, California, and raised by Christian pastor parents; she grew up listening to only gospel music and sang in church as a child. After earning a GED during her freshman year of high school, she began to pursue a music career. She released a self-titled gospel album in 2001 as Katy Hudson which failed with the closing of its record label that year. She recorded an album with production team The Matrix and completed most of a solo album from 2004–2005, neither of which was released.
After signing on with Capitol Music Group in 2007, her fourth record label in seven years, she adopted the stage name Katy Perry and released her first Internet single, "Ur So Gay", that November, which garnered attention but did not chart. She rose to fame with her second single "I Kissed a Girl" in 2008, which topped international charts. Perry's first mainstream album, One of the Boys, followed later that year and was eventually announced to be the thirty-third best selling album of 2008 worldwide. It was accredited platinum certification by the Recording Industry Association of America; "I Kissed a Girl" and her second single "Hot n Cold" both received multi-platinum certifications. Perry was ranked the 97th Artist of the 2000–10 decade by Billboard. She became known for wearing unconventional style of dress, often combining bold colors and vintage fashion. Her next album, Teenage Dream, was released on August 24, 2010 in the United States and Canada. It was released August 30, 2010 worldwide and debuted at number one on the Billboard 200.


The Maccabees are a rock band from London, England. They have released two albums so far, Colour It In, with a follow-up, Wall of Arms, released on 4th May 2009. Their debut single, "X-Ray", was released on Promise records on 28 November 2005, and received some evening play on London radio station Xfm London. They received little significant exposure, however, until six months later, when they released their second single, "Latchmere", the subject of which is the wave machine at the Latchmere Leisure Centre in Battersea, South London, on Fierce Panda Records in April 2006. This was championed by Radio 1 DJ Steve Lamacq and received airtime on MTV2. The video, directed by Hugh Frost and Samuel Bebbington, also proved an internet hit after it was posted on YouTube.
The band are currently signed to major label Fiction Records, and released their début album Colour It In in May 2007. Because an early copy of the album appeared on the New York Times website, Colour It In became available to download exclusively from iTunes on 16 December, before its physical release on 14 May, in an effort to combat the leak. The single "First Love" was their first to chart in the UK top 40, and was followed by "About Your Dress", which peaked at #33. Their album fared much better, which was released to positive reviews, and charted at #24. They recently toured the USA with fellow indie group Bloc Party. A full UK tour followed from October 2007, culminating in a sell-out show at the Roundhouse venue in London.
During late 2007, Samsung used the track "Toothpaste Kisses" in its advert campaign for its SGH-G800 mobile phone.
On the run-up to the release of their second album, the band played two new songs to Steve Lamacq on his "In New Music We Trust" show on Radio 1 in May 2008, "No Kind Words" and "Young Lions". The band also played a string of small venues in the UK to test out new songs, in March and April 2008. The Maccabees performed at Offset Festival in London as well the Underage Festival in August 2008.
On Zane Lowe's Radio 1 show in February 2009, Felix confirmed the name of the follow-up album to be Wall of Arms, an announcement that coincided with the release of the free downloadable track, "No Kind Words". On March 16th Radio 1 DJ Steve Lamacq played the band's first single from "Wall Of Arms" entitled "Love You Better", the video to which was posted exclusively on ClashMusic.com on March 27.
Wall of Arms was released on May 4th, 2009. It entered the UK albums chart at No.13 and received positive reviews with the NME giving the album 8/10. At the end of the year, Artrocker made the album joint No.1 Album of 2009 along with Yeah Yeah Yeahs' "It's Blitz!"


The Enemy are an English rock band formed in Coventry in 2006, signed to Warner Music Group (UK). In June 2007, The Enemy played twice at Glastonbury Festival, first in the 'Guardian Lounge' on Saturday and then the much larger 'Other Stage' on Sunday. They also headlined on the Saturday night of T in the Park in the 'Futures' tent on 7 July 2007. The band's debut album We'll Live and Die in These Towns (2007) went straight to Number 1 in the UK Albums chart on release. In the United States they are marketed as The Enemy UK. Their song "Be Somebody" is currently used for the title sequence of ITV's FA Cup football coverage.
Drummer Liam Watts and bass player Andy Hopkins originate from Coventry, while frontman/multi-instrumentalist Tom Clarke is originally from Birmingham. Clarke and Hopkins attended Finham Park Secondary School in the south west of the city, while Watts studied at Cardinal Newman secondary school.
The Enemy met their original manager, John Dawkins, because Watts' aunt worked with one of Dawkins' family members. Dawkins asked producer Matt Terry to do him a favor and give the band cheap studio time. Terry then produced their first set of three songs: 'Heart Attack', 'Had Enough' and '40 Days and 40 Nights'. Dawkins then forwarded the demos to David Bianchi at A&R Warner.
In 2006 the band were the opening act at Coventry's Godiva Festival, and again played the event in July 2007 as second headliners beneath the Super Furry Animals. In 2008 they were the headline act in front of 10,000 fans.
They first gained acclaim when they were mentioned in NME as the act most likely to "break your windows" for 2007. They supported Oasis, The Fratellis, Kasabian, The Paddingtons, Ash, Manic Street Preachers and Stereophonics on their UK tours.
Their single, "Away From Here" entered the charts at number 8 and its follow-up "Had Enough" entered the charts at number 4.
Building on their rapid exposure, The Enemy appeared on the NME 2007 Rock 'N' Roll Riot Tour during September and October 2007 along with Lethal Bizzle and The Wombats as well as the Jersey Live Festival. They also supported The Rolling Stones on the last night of their European tour at the O2 Arena.
March 2008 saw the band start production on their second album and playing six nights in a row at the London Astoria.
In April 2008 the band played at Coventry's Ricoh Arena, selling out two nights. The next month they supported Kaiser Chiefs at Elland Road Stadium. They then headlined the Godiva Festival on 5 July 2008, a 30,000 capacity free gig in Coventry's War Memorial Park. They played Reading & Leeds Festivals on the main stage in August.
Along with Kasabian and Twisted Wheel, The Enemy supported Oasis on their 2009 Dig Out Your Soul Tour, which included the Ricoh Arena gig in The Enemy's hometown of Coventry. In March and April 2009 the band embarked on their own UK & Ireland tour, playing to 70,000 people, with Twisted Wheel as support as well as Kid British. Birmingham singer Emma Skipp joined them on "No Time for Tears".


Elena Jane Goulding (born 30 December 1986), better known as Ellie Goulding, is an English singer-songwriter and guitarist. She rose to fame after topping the BBC Sound of 2010 poll and winning the Critics' Choice award at the 2010 BRIT Awards. After signing to Polydor Records in 2009, Goulding released her first extended play, An Introduction to Ellie Goulding, followed by her debut full-length studio album, Lights, in 2010. Signed to Polydor Records in September 2009, her debut single "Under the Sheets" was released on independent label Neon Gold Records rather than Polydor so that she would not be put under too much pressure. Premiered on BBC Radio 1 on 30 September 2009, it has since gained heavy airplay. It was released digitally in the United Kingdom on 15 November 2009 and peaked at number fifty-three on the UK Singles Chart. In October 2009 she toured the UK supporting Little Boots, and on 30 October 2009 performed "Under the Sheets" and "Guns and Horses" as a guest on Later... with Jools Holland. Wish I'd Stayed was single of the Week on the UK iTunes Store from 22–28 December 2009—and she provided the vocals for the Starsmith remix of Passion Pit's "Sleepyhead".
Prior to the release of her debut studio album, it was announced that Goulding topped the BBC Sound of 2010 poll, which showcases the critics, broadcasters and music industry insiders' top choices for rising stars and artists for the coming year. She also won the Critics' Choice Award at the 2010 BRIT Awards which makes her the second artist to win both the poll and win the Critic's Choice award in the same year, after Adele won both awards two years previous.
Goulding's debut album, entitled Lights, was through Polydor on 1 March 2010, preceded by its second single, "Starry Eyed", which was released 22 February 2010 and reached number four on the UK Singles Chart—Goulding's highest-peaking single on the chart as yet. For the majority of the album, Goulding worked with English producer Starsmith. It reached number one on the UK Albums Chart and number twelve on the Irish Albums Chart in March 2010. "Guns and Horses" was released as the album's third single on 17 May 2010, peaking at number twenty-six on the UK chart. Released on 9 August 2010, "The Writer" followed as the album's fourth single, reaching number nineteen in the UK. Alongside the release of her debut album, Goulding co-wrote a song with George Astasio, Gabriella Cilmi, Jason Pebworth and Jon Shave for Cilmi's second album, Ten, titled "Love Me Cos You Want To". She also co-wrote three songs for Diana Vickers's debut album, Songs from the Tainted Cherry Tree, entitled "Remake Me + You", "Notice" and "Jumping Into Rivers" (all three co-written with Vickers and Guy Sigsworth). Goulding is currently embarking on her Lights Tour in the United Kingdom, accompanied by support act Primary 1. She also supported John Mayer on his British tour in May 2010. She performed on June 25 at the 40th Glastonbury Festival and is expected to perform at numerous other music festivals across the United Kingdom including V Festival 2010 and Bestival. A track from Lights, "Everytime You Go", was featured in the television hit "The Vampire Diaries". The song was featured in season 1, episode 22 titled "Founder's Day". The track "Your Biggest Mistake" was used on an episode of The Inbetweeners. Goulding penned some lyrics for Tinie Tempah's album Disc-Overy, and later she sang guest vocals on the song. Her fifth and final single from her debut album Lights will be the official iTunes bonus track 'Lights'.


Vampire Weekend is an American indie rock band from New York City, formed in 2006 and signed to XL Recordings. The band released its first album Vampire Weekend in 2008, which produced the singles "Mansard Roof", "A-Punk", "Oxford Comma", and "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa". The band's most recent album, Contra, was released in 2010.
Ezra Koenig, Chris Baio, Rostam Batmanglij, and Chris Tomson formed the band in February 6, 2006, when they were finishing up their studies at Columbia University. Vampire Weekend's name is derived from lead singer Ezra Koenig's amateur film of the same name. Koenig and drummer Chris Tomson first collaborated as members of the comedy-rap band "L'Homme Run".[1] They were signed to XL Recordings, of which the band said in an interview: "Before any labels had contacted us, we actually mentioned XL as the kind of label we'd ideally like to end up on. Just going on their roster alone, they obviously have good taste and support their artists well." They are managed by Ian Montone, who also manages The White Stripes.
The band gained attention via a variety of blogs, such as Stereogum. The band is influenced by both African popular music and Western classical music, describing their genre of music as "Upper West Side Soweto", with such songs as "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa" referencing Congolese soukous music.
In 2007, Vampire Weekend's song "Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa" was ranked 67th on Rolling Stone's list of the '100 Best Songs of the Year'. In November 2007, they toured the Netherlands with The Shins. They were declared "The Year's Best New Band" by Spin magazine in the March 2008 issue, and were the first band to be shot for the cover of the magazine before releasing their debut album. Four songs from the band's first album also made the Triple J Hottest 100, 2008.
The band's debut album Vampire Weekend was released January 29, 2008. It was a success in the US and UK, peaking at number 15 on the UK Albums Chart and number 17 on the Billboard 200. Four singles were released from the album; while "A-Punk" peaked at number 25 on the Billboard Modern Rock chart and number 55 on the UK Singles Chart, "Oxford Comma" peaked at number 38 in the UK. "A-Punk" was ranked the 4th on Rolling Stone's list of Best Songs in 2008. "A- Punk" was also used to open the Will Ferrell/John C. Reilly feature Step Brothers, and featured in the UK television show, The Inbetweeners, and the video games Guitar Hero 5 and LEGO Rock Band. In 2008, Vampire Weekend was dubbed the "whitest band" by Christian Lander, the creator of the site Stuff White People Like, in an interview with Salon.com. During the summer of 2008, Vampire Weekend performed at the Central Park SummerStage. The band's second album, Contra, was released on January 11, 2010 in the UK and the following day in the US. On October 5, 2009, "Horchata" was released as a free download on the band's website. The album's first single, "Cousins", was released on November 17, 2009. Initial copies of the CD and LP sold at independent records stores in the US include a 3-track bonus CD containing two "melts", which featured bits of album tracks and a remix. Contra was the band's first album to debut at #1 on the Billboard 200.
On January 9, 2010 the band did an acoustic show for MTV Unplugged. The following month, the band toured Europe and UK with Canadian electro duo Fan Death as their support. The video for their next single "Giving Up the Gun" was also released on February 18, 2010 which included cameos from Joe Jonas, Lil Jon, RZA, Jake Gyllenhaal and Daft Punk.
On March 6, 2010 the band appeared as the musical guest of Saturday Night Live with comedian Zach Galifianakis as host. It is the second time the band has appeared as a musical guest on the show, the first being during the show's 33rd season in 2008 in an episode which actress Amy Adams hosted. They also played festivals across the USA such as Coachella, Bonnaroo and All Points West, as well as the Groovin' The Moo festival in Australia.
On June 3, 2010 the band was interviewed by Stephen Colbert on the Colbert Report. Colbert argued that the "Oxford Comma" was indeed important despite the band and Ezra's disagreement. The band also played their song "Holiday" from Contra. On June 5, the band played in Philadelphia, PA as part of the 3rd annual Roots Picnic, hosted by the band The Roots.

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