IN REVIEW: Car Seat Headrest - "Making a Door Less Open"

When last we got an album of new music from Car Seat Headrest, it won my Album of the Year award; 2016's Teens of Denial took a '90s indie throwback approach and infused it with Will Toledo's witty songwriting to create an album that was simultaneously nostalgic and of the moment. It was a thrilling record that won Toledo accolades and immediately put him (in the minds of many fans and critics, at least) at the forefront of the indie rock movement. To me, Teens of Denial was a fresh and reassuring record, one that proved that rock was in good hands. When the decision was made to re-record one if his bedroom classics as Twin Fantasy (Face to Face), it too was well received and, even if it wasn't a proper follow-up, it eased anticipation for what was due to come after such an excellent album as Teens of Denial.

Now, success in music is kind of subjective, especially in these modern times, and responses to success can vary wildly depending on the artist. In the case of Car Seat Headrest, consensus seemed to dictate that Car Seat Headrest were on the leading edge of indie rock, and Toledo recognized as a singular talent in terms of ambition and vision. The anxiety at the core of his songs was relatable, his heart an open book through his lyrics and his music a manifestation of coming of age in tense times. Somehow, releasing an album that a lot of like-minded people gravitated toward and being established as an important figure in music made Toledo want to run the other way; the result is Making a Door Less Open, a bizarre and alienating attempt at rebelling against his own perceived success, incorporating electronics, vastly different songwriting, alter egos and precious few remnants of what made Car Seat Headrest so endearing.

Music history is littered with shining examples of artists shedding their old image in stunning fashion. Radiohead seemed to do it every album cycle for a while, Wilco created their career-defining works while crawling out from under the shadow of their alt-country roots, Liars spiked the tastemakers' punch with a wild concept album about witches, and the list goes on and on. The thing is, Will Toledo isn't Thom Yorke, and Car Seat Headrest aren't Liars; Making a Door Less Open aspires to be a thrilling new direction, and yet it lacks the commitment and focus that other great examples have given us over time. Going electro-pop is an exhausted career move at this point, but for some reason that's the go-to for Toledo; drum machines, synthesizers and voice effects are the lazy man's way to be different, and Making a Door Less Open sounds very lazy by times.

It starts off promising enough, although the lead-in to Weightlifters is a disorienting start; recalling Kid A-era Radiohead with a Pretty Hate Machine beat, this song at least has the DNA of what one would consider a Car Seat Headrest song as it unfolds, and it does overall convey Toledo's need to change effectively. Lead single Can't Cool Me Down, however, comes off as one of the album's most confused and cluttered songs; the hook is catchy, but the music surrounding it is packed with forced weirdness, shimmering synths, skittering percussion and one of the most awful keyboard lines I've ever heard. It's a baffling song, one that sounds like the priority was fucking with people as opposed to, you know, being a good song.

The closest thing we get to familiar is Deadlines (Hostile), an honest to goodness rock song that only exists on the streaming version; a second, very electronic and completely different song called Deadlines (Thoughtful) comes later, while neither is present on the physical edition in favour of Deadlines, yet another completely different song that features both guitars and electronic components. The only thing tying these three songs together is the lyric "can't get connected", which of course must be why an artist would offer up three different songs with the same title while keeping one of them away from streaming and two of them away from the physical editions, preventing fans from ever owning or streaming a complete version of the album. It smacks of difficulty for the sake of difficulty, which is a running theme throughout Making a Door Less Open.

The one song detractors are pointing to more than any other on this album is Hollywood, and with good reason. It's undoubtedly a rock song, but it's a dumb rock song; it's got Toledo rapping, screeching and snarling in ways that seems designed to be off-putting, while his lyrics are uncharacteristically trite (he actually rhymes "movie" with "groovy"). Its message is clear; Hollywood is bad (and, according to Toledo, "makes (him) want to puke". Oof. It'll get play on rock radio, but oof. That's followed by what's specified as a remix of Hymn, and if the original version exists on some obscure edition of the album I can't be assed to find it. Barely a song at all, it's basically just Toledo repeating "I feel it in my heart" with varying degrees of annoying effects over a generic dance beat. Nothing special, and that's how the first half ends.

The second half starts out with more promise; Martin has some skittering beats in the background but, at its core, it's in line with what makes Toledo so well regarded; it's a well-written, heartfelt tune that can't even be derailed by the pitched up vocals that enter toward its ending. Then, we get the aforementioned Deadlines (Thoughtful), which is an EDM number that treats guitar like an uninvited guest, relegating it to a slapdash performance riddled with effects while offering little beyond an ass-shaking beat over the course of its six minutes. A half-assed acoustic segué follows before we get to Life Worth Missing, an act of slight redemption with what I think might be real drums and the skeleton of a real Car Seat Headrest song poking out from under its thick synth skin. 

The closing ten minutes of Making a Door Less Open is about as pleasant as what came before; There Must Be More Than Blood crawls along on a slow, basic beat while Toledo once again appears to be playing guitar badly on purpose. The song adds elements as it progresses at its glacial pace, but where past CSH epics kept listeners engaged with the tension and gusto behind their performances, There Must Be More Than Blood just meanders for the majority of its seven and a half minutes. The second half closes the same way the first did, with an annoyingly electronic half-song, except this time Toledo's mouths lines like "please, let this matter" and "please, let somebody care about this" before repeating "change your mind". Is he begging for me to like this record? That won't work.

Look, I recognize Will Toledo's gifts, and I know he's too talented to fail outright; there's some merit to be heard here, and I'm sure the intentions were earnest. However, just because you feel like running away from the sound that got you noticed, doesn't mean I have to accept the result as a brave, visionary move. Making a Door Less Open isn't visionary in the slightest, it's the sound of an artist developing a nagging urge to subvert expectations, overcompensating by playing with a bunch of new toys in the studio and hoping the resultant album buys the same street cred other, more established artists got when they made their big, daring moves.

May 1, 2020 • Matador

Highlights Weightlifters • Deadlines (Hostile) • Martin