Spectreview: Car Seat Headrest – Making A Door Less Open

Car Seat Headrest’s first album of new material since 2016’s career-defining Teens of Denial capitulates under too much carefree exploration.

-OLIVE-

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“Please let this matter
No one can see this
Or know that I need it”

Sometimes making music can feel like operating under a curse. If you’re the kind of person who cares, really cares, about making good music, the process can pull everything out of you: your energy, your vulnerabilities, your emotional capacity. Will Toledo likely knows this well. His intense prolific streak earned him the kind of exponential cult following that every enterprising independent songwriter dreams of. When it was finally time to sign to a notable label and face the music world at large, he did not disappoint. 2016’s Teens of Denial provided a welcome breath of fresh air to a genre that was fast growing stale, and its strength helped catapult the young musician into underground stardom. Of course, then comes everything that tier of success entails: endless tours, endless offers, endless adulations from people whose opinions can’t ever be trusted.

If he eventually reached the point where he wished he was just another person back making songs in his room, it wouldn’t be surprising. Making a Door Less Open, the band’s first collection of all-new material since its Matador debut, finds Toledo understandably exhausted. That exhaustion runs like an electric current through almost every aspect of this release, from its hodgepodge collection of styles to its low-expectation liner notes. It covers a lot of ground – including dance-y electronic workouts and drone-like experimental textures – that Car Seat Headrest isn’t typically known for, and how you’ll feel about will come down to how much you’re willing to lend Toledo and bandmate/producer Andrew Katz the benefit of the doubt. For as long as previous releases have been, there’s still a sense of quality control that earned Toledo his cult status. Here, even if Making a Door Less Open is one of his shortest albums, a good chunk of the material here feels disconcertingly tossed-off. Tracks like the peculiarly straight-faced admonishment of “Hollywood” or the undercooked “Hymn (Remix)” feel included merely as provocation, or as evidence that Toledo is deliberately trying to lower expectations. Even its best tracks, which mostly come near the end, are lacking in the mixing department, which also raises eyebrows considering the record is self-produced.

So it’s not a consistent record in the slightest, but that shouldn’t diminish what it’s doing right. For one, Will Toledo still bears one of the most compelling voices in current indie rock: clear, laid-back, earnest but not overly dramatic, it’s a grounding presence throughout whatever he happens to be throwing at us here. And while some songs suffer greatly from that quasi-experimental approach, others, like the oft-shifting arrangements of “Weightlifters” and “Can’t Cool Me Down” do provide a sense of unpredictability that softens the blow on first listen. And the band can still do wonders with a long song, as evidenced by the climactic “There Must Be More Than Blood.” All things considered, it’s conceivable that this record just needs ample time to sink in fully, but it’s also possible that Toledo is simply tired of answering questions about meanings and easter eggs and wants to go back to following his heart. If that gives us a record that’s less expected craft than scattershot spontaneity, who are we to disagree?

Recommended for making music in your room.