Vampire Weekend - 'Giving Up The Gun'

What this video is

Released February 19, 2010, as the second single from Vampire Weekend's second album Contra — which debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 — this video arrived at the apex of the band's cultural capital. The Malloys translated the song's themes of youthful competition and obsolescence into a high-concept indoor tennis tournament populated with eclectic celebrity cameos (RZA as line judge, Jake Gyllenhaal, Joe Jonas,…

Why it matters

A landmark video in the Vampire Weekend catalog and in early-2010s indie rock visual culture, 'Giving Up the Gun' exemplifies the high-concept celebrity-cameo music video format that dominated VEVO's launch era (2009–2011). The Malloys' sports-tournament conceit became a widely cited example of…

The director

The Malloys is the working name of brothers Emmett and Brendan Malloy, self-taught LA-based directors who first gained recognition filming surf culture documentaries before transitioning to music videos in the late 1990s. Their Foo Fighters 'Breakout' video…