Standing outside Neumo's Wednesday night, a friend of ours started ruminating on his recent house-hunting experience in the Central District: All the new places being advertised, he said, were townhouse style units with garages below them. The effect reminded him of frontier forts, with their wooden walls separating them from the wilderness. How exactly our conversation led from Vampire Weekend's concert inside to this is a little hazy, but it nevertheless summarizes the band pretty well: Much like those urban fortresses in the CD that keep their residents safely above street level, Vampire Weekend, notwithstanding their tightness and pop transcultural experimentation, is also about making black people's stuff safe for white people. more ›