Rostam Batmanglij Quits Vampire Weekend
Vampire Weekend co-founder and songwriter Rostam Batmanglij has left the band, according to a note posted on Twitter.
“I wanted to let ppl kno [sic] I’m no longer a member of VW but that [frontman] Ezra [Koenig] and I will continue to collaborate on future projects and future VW,” he wrote. “My identity as a songwriter and producer, I realized, needs to stand on its own. Still connected to the ppl I work with, but through the songs we make together.”
A representative for Vampire Weekend declined to comment on Batmanglij’s departure
The announcement comes just weeks after Batmanglij released a new solo track as Rostam, “EOS.” At the time, he told Pitchfork, “I’d like to release solo songs on a regular basis, but it’s pretty difficult for me to finish them. But I think that may happen this year. That would make me happy.”
“EOS” marked Batmanglij’s first solo song since releasing a pair of tracks, “Wood” and “Don’t Let It Get to You,” in 2011. Two years prior, he and Ra Ra Riot singer Wes Miles released an album, aptly titled LP, as Discovery. Over the years Batmanglij has collaborated with a growing number of artists, including Walkmen frontman Hamilton Leithauser (two songs on his solo LP Black Hours), Charli XCX (“Need Ur Luv”) and Carly Rae Jepsen (“Warm Blood”).
“I can’t even begin to express the joy I get from writing songs, both on my own and with others, I hold it all sacred,” Batmanglij wrote in his note. “There is so much amazing music — all of it dear to me — on its way to you. It’s an exciting time. And I feel lucky to share it with you.”
In that same Pitchfork interview, Batmanglij said he was working with Leithauser on a new album, while he also confirmed he’d been in the studio with PC Music’s A.G. Cook. As for Vampire Weekend, Batmanglij said it was “too early” to talk about the follow-up to the band’s 2013 LP, Modern Vampires of the City.
He did say, however, “I’m always making beats, and when I can hear Ezra singing on one of them in my head, I send it to him. That’s one of the ways that we’ve always worked together. In Vampire Weekend, I often express myself in terms of the bigger picture stuff with subconscious choices that I make while I’m making the music.”