“Hell hath no fury like a Saab owner scorned” is something both We and the lads of Vampire Weekend can say they learned this week after the band inadvertently incurred the fiery wrath of a clan you most definitely do not want to fuck with: Saab 900 Enthusiasts.
The band came under fire this week from guardians of the now defunct car manufacturer for purchasing and burning two crappy old 900s in the music video for new single Diane Young, something a staunch protector of the endangered species claims was carried out under false pretences and is a gross offence to those that take gross offence at automobile-immolation; those who clearly don’t understand the transfer of ownership that takes place in the transaction known as The Purchasing of Goods in Exchange For Monies, goods that then no longer belong to you, The Previous Owner, leaving The New Owner to do with said goods what they will. Basically you have no province over the fate and use of junk that no longer belongs to you. Simple stuff, really.
A deeply upset Jalopnik piece lovingly titled ‘Vampire Weekend Are a Bunch of Dicks‘ took aim at the band for the grievous act, the setting alight of two cars that they now legally owned; cars that no longer worked but that “were deeply loved by their owners who wanted to see them go to a nice new home. The old owners were completely unaware of the cars’ fate.“
Extra in a scene in Girls that one time, brother of a famous Tumblr blogger with a book deal and sometimes frontman arzE Koenig has responded to their tepid outrage with a heartfelt defence of his band’s artistic choices, telling Spinner, “I want people to understand that we do respect cars and the last thing we want to do is to fuck up a collector’s item or something like that.
Hopefully people believe me when I say that our record label was looking to purchase the cheapest, oldest cars possible; they weren’t trying to buy a beautiful perfect condition car.
If the people selling their cars felt mislead by the production company that bought them… of course if we had been there, if we had been a part of it we would never lie to somebody just to get a car — we could have easily found something else.
Stuff like that, we hope that that wasn’t done dishonorably.
Plus, [band member] Rostam Batmanglij “especially loves Saabs. When he grew up his family drove a Saab.“
