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Vampire Weekend - Step
Every time I see you in the world
You always step to my girl
Back back way back
I used to front like angkor what
Mechanicsburg, anchorage, and dar e salaam
While home in new york
Was champagne and disco tapes
From L. A. Slash san francisco
But actually oakland and not alameda
Your girl was in berkely with her communist reader
Mine was entombed within boombox and walkman
I was a hoarder but girl that was back then
The gloves are off
The wisdom teeth are out
What you on about?
I feel it in my bones
I feel it in my bonesss
I’m stronger now
I’m ready for the house.
Such a modest mouse
I Can’t do it alone
I Can’t do it aloneee
Every time I see you in the world
You always step to my girl
Ancestors told me
That their girl was better
She’s richer than croesus
She’s tougher than leather
I just ignored all the tales of a past life
Stale conversation deserves but a bread knife
And punks who would laugh
When they saw us together
Well they didn’t know
How to dress for the weather
I can still see them there huddled on astor
Snow falling slow to the sound of the master
The gloves are off
The wisdom teeth are out
What you on about?
I feel it in my bones
I feel it in my bonesss
I’m stronger now
I’m ready for the house.
Such a modest mouse
I Can’t do it alone
I Can’t do it aloneee
Wisdom’s a gift but you’d trade it for youth
Age is an honor it’s still not the truth
We saw the stars when they hid from the world
You cursed the sun when it stepped to your girl
Maybe she’s gone and I can’t resurrect her
The truth is she doesn’t need me to protect her
We know the true death
The true way of our flesh
Everyone’s dying but girl you’re not old yet
The gloves are off
The wisdom teeth are out
What you on about?
I feel it in my bones
I feel it in my bonesss
I’m stronger now
I’m ready for the house.
Such a modest mouse
I Can’t do it alone
I Can’t do it aloneee
The gloves are off
The wisdom teeth are out
What you on about?
I feel it in my bones
I feel it in my bonesss
I’m stronger now
I’m ready for the house.
Such a modest mouse
I Can’t do it alone
I Can’t do it aloneee
Every time I see you in the world
You always step to my girl
“Step” is inspired by “Step to My Girl” by Souls of Mischief. Per the band: “Souls Of Mischief I’ve always loved. I kind of associate them with the first time that I really started become a music fan as a young teenager. This song apparently was recorded around the time of their first album, which was called "93 ‘til Infinity", but it never made the record and it floated around as a bootleg for awhile. I only discovered it five or six years ago but it always really stuck with me, especially the chorus. I didn’t know where it came from but they’re kind of like scratching somebody saying, "Every time I see you in the world, you always step to my girl.” Slowly as I listened to this song, I found myself kind of writing this alternate song based on that phrase." Souls Of Mischief, however, also recycled this line which appeared first in YZ’s “Who’s That Girl.” The first verse is almost a parody of the early Vampire Weekend lyrics, as they’re so dense and knotty that they are really superfluous and unnecessary to advance the melody. That was part of their charm, if you are into that kind of thing, but could be alienating as well. This narrator rejects that knowingness for deeper, more primitive truths. Given the recurring references to an ex from northern California on "Contra", it’s possible that this one might have been written during (or cut from?) that album. The official lyrics video shows scenes of New York in a black-and-white scheme reminiscent of the iconic opening to Woody Allen’s "Manhattan".
