Vampire Weekend debuted their latest song on Jimmy Kimmel Live Halloween night, sporting ghoulish skeleton makeup appropriate to both the holiday and the post-Hurricane Sandy mood. There's a touch of the macabre in "Unbelievers," too: "We know the fire awaits unbelievers/All of the sinners the same/Girl, you and I will die unbelievers bound to the tracks of the train," coos frontman Ezra Koenig. The song points to new directions for the New York indie heroes as fans await their third LP, with lyrics that mull the big questions – faith and apostasy, love and fate, life and death – and skittering, jittery music that jettisons the band's usual African borrowings for something more like power pop. But the melodies are still strong, the harmonies still bright – and there's still a view of Cape Cod Bay from Vampire Weekend's picture window. "I know I love you," sings Koenig. "And you love the sea." 

Listen to "Unbelievers":

“Everyday People”

"Everyday People" managed to trailblaze in two different ways -- it was one of the first pop hits to deal with the subject of racial harmony, and it utilized Larry Graham's "slap" technique on the bass guitar, which would soon be copied by countless other bassists. Graham once said about his pulsating style, "I'd never done that before … that's where the freedom of creativity came in for the band, that we'd be allowed to do that." In 1978, the song's line "Different strokes for different folks" would be borrowed for the title of the hit television show Diff'rent Strokes.