Damn, we've missed Hamilton Leithauser's voice.
The former Walkman has joined forces once again with now ex-Vampire Weekender Rostam Batmanglij to grace us with "A 1000 Times," a lovely tune that breaks right out of the gate with Leithauser's full register of glorious pleading howls. The potential energy is immediately palpable in the delicate opening few seconds that serve only to set the stage for a vocal main course that doesn't really let up once it starts.
The official debut of the newly-christened Hamilton Leithauser + Rostam duo, it's the first taste of what the latter told Pitchfork "might be one of the best records I make in my whole life." Rostam elaborated on Sirius XMU, explaining,
“I always wanted to try to really capture [Leithauser’s] voice in a way I felt like maybe it had never been captured before, just in terms of how it was recorded, and also pushing him to really scream, because it’s interesting. His voice has this kind of choir boy aspect to it, but then when he screams, it’s like a little bit of the choir boy is still intact, and I think that’s a special blend of things. He sings in a way like no one else sings. So I kind of felt like it was my role as the producer, to bring that out of him. And I think ‘A 1000 Times’ is probably one of the best examples of that.”
As long as he keeps belting like that, we're sold.