Album Review: Changephobia by Rostam

Since then, he's been busy, adding his instantly identifiable production and song writing touch to work for a list of artists that reads like a who's who of the music world: Hamilton Leithauser (the two would go on to release the excellent collaborative album I Had a Dream That You Were Mine), Charli XCX , Carly Rae Jepsen , Maggie Rogers , Clairo , Frank Ocean , Solange , and his most frequent collaborators, HAIM - their latest album Women In Music Pt. III earning Rostam his second Grammy nod. In amongst all that, he found the time to release his solo debut Half-Light in 2017, a patchwork of songs - sometimes hushed, sometimes effervescent - that displayed Rostam 's unique ability to effortlessly meld genres and sounds into pretty melodies and ultra-percussive beats.

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Change is hard. If there's anything the past few years have proven, it's that even the threat of upheaval can send anyone into an anxious fit. Rostam Batmanglij is no stranger to change. As a member of Vampire Weekend, he was once a poster child for late-aughts indie rock and the hipsterfication of Brooklyn. Now, the multi-instrumentalist, producer and songwriter is a Los Angeles-based free agent, collaborating with anyone that suits his artistic muse, a transition roughly the equivalent of ditching your family and starting a new business.

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The ecstatic peak of Changephobia arrives in "4Runner," an instant addition to the canon of jangly, smeared-pastel pop songs about cars: It feels wrong to listen at any speed under 50 mph. "Take off a shift for me/I'm waiting down the street," Rostam Batmanglij sings in a conversational tone, the kind of writing and delivery that invokes the magic of the everyday. "Take all the time you want to come, come, come." It's a good example of what works about Changephobia, which often wrestles with expression and finding the right words.

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