I Just Read About That…

[ATTENDED: September 18, 2018] Car Seat Headrest

Car Seat Headrest had one of the most annoying crowds I’ve ever been a part of.  The show was sold out and I got there later than I meant to.  So I was more in the middle of the crowd than up front.  Usually this is a pretty tame spot, but this crowd was rowdy, with a lot of individuals pogoing pretty hard (enough to get me pretty angry at one particular guy–which rather spoiled my mood for a couple of songs).

In fact a few things were irritating me this night which made it kind of hard for me to get into Car Seat Headrest.  The crowd was one but also was the fact that they took forever to get on stage after Naked Giants left (I realize now that Naked Giants were in the live Car Seat Headrest band, and they probably could use a breather, but it was a long wait between bands).

Car Seat Headrest was just Will Toledo for many years.  From 2010-2015 he released 12 albums (!) on bandcamp.  He has gotten a band [Will Toledo (vocals, guitar, piano), Ethan Ives (guitar, bass, backing vocals), Seth Dalby (bass), and Andrew Katz (drums, percussion)], then he/they signed to Matador, re-recorded a bunch of old songs for a compilation, made a new album and then re-recorded one of his older albums.

I was really surprised by how rocking and crazy the band were live.  I love when a band is bigger than their album makes them seem, so this boded well.

The musicians came out on stage.  One guitarist, two guitarists, three guitarists (!) and none of them were Will Toledo.  They played a trippy distorted jam for a few minutes as I tried to get my bearings on the band (notes say this was part of “The End of Dramamine”).  The lights were totally stadium lights (in club format)–this was going to be a big rock show (not bad for a guy who recorded his first albums in his car).

Will came out and sang a song I didn’t know.  I haven’t listened to the re-released Twin Fantasy much, so I assumed it was one of those songs. It was super catchy (turns out it was a Lou Reed song, huh).

Then they played “Bodys” which sounded so much bigger than on record.  On record Will sings almost deadpan, but he was really singing powerfully.  And the band was totally rocking out.  The lights were frenetic, the crowd was crazy and the song was totally fun.  But this is the kind of song where it really helps if you know the words and the parts.  And I didn’t, so I was a bit left out of the frenzy.

It was somewhere around the next song, the wonderfully titled “(Joe Gets Kicked Out of School for Using) Drugs With Friends (But Says This Isn’t a Problem)” that I realized that one of the guitarists was Grant Mullen from Naked Giants (his hair is pretty unmistakable) and that the guy on the far stage was Naked Giants’ bassist Gianni Aiello although for this show he was playing guitar and keyboards.  After a few minutes I realized that Naked Giants’ drummer Henry LaVallee was also playing percussion, so the entire trio helped to make up all of Car Seat Headrest.  Mullen and Ethan Ives traded off leads and solos throughout the show.

I know the Teens of Denial album pretty well, so I was excited to hear “Fill in the Blank.”  This is the song where the obnoxious pogo dude and I had an altercation which put me in a foul mood (ironically as Toledo was singing “you have no right to be depressed, you haven’t tried hard enough to like it”).

By the way, everyone and I mean everyone, knew the words to every song.  It’s possible that at other shows since I often stand near the front I’m not aware of how much the people in the middle are singing along, but it was undeniable during these songs.  Like “Cute Thing” which I didn’t know at all, but during the quiet part “I got so fucking romantic I apologize Lemme light your cigarette Come visit Kansas for a week of debauchery Songs and high fives and weird sex” it wasn’t quiet with all the people shouting along.

The songs are pretty complicated in general and I feel like the nuance was lost on many of them (replaced by three guitars, or a noisy crowd), but the backing harmonies always sounded good.

“Sober to Death” is a mellow song that I didn’t know.  It was a good slow down for this crazy crowd.  Ethan Ives took a sweet classic-rock-sounding guitar solo and then suddenly he played the riff from Neil Young’s “Powderfinger.”  This is one of my favorite Neil Young songs, so this picked up my mood tremendously.  Ives didn’t have a great voice or anything (some might say that Young doesn’t either) but it was loose and wonderful and the band sounded amazing, especially with the backing oohs.  It returned seamlessly to “Sober.” and the end part sounded even better after the Neil Young kiss.

I was totally unfamiliar with “America (Never Been)” which came from a free EP (which is nearly an hour) he released in 2014.  It starts out slow but like many of his songs it builds and builds and takes long than you might think.

There are two Car Seat Headrest songs that I love.  One of them is the single, “Drunk Drivers/Killers Whales.”  I was super excited when they played it (as was everyone else).  This was also the first really rocking song they’d played for about 15 minutes so the crowd was insane.  In a good way.  My good mood was restored.

I didn’t recognize “Destroyed By Hippie Powers” even though it’s on Teens of Denial.  They rocked it out for a long while and it sounded great.  And then they brought a little kid up on stage.  I had seen him walking around earlier–he rather forcibly pushed his way through the crowd to get closer (I assume with his parents).  They gave him a cowbell and he jammed with the band for the end of “Hippie.”

I didn’t know “Something Soon” or the Dexy’s Midnight Runners cover that they added to the song although the vocal harmonizing sounded wonderful.

And then they left the stage.

I was genuinely surprised that the main set was over as it had been barely an hour.  I knew there were more songs of theirs that I wanted to hear, although I couldn’t remember which ones at the time.  When they came out for the encore, they seemed to dither about the song choice and I got really excited when Ives played the opening riff to “Vincent” (my favorite song of his).

But it was just a tease and they immediately shut that down as Will announced that they would play “Beach Life-In-Death.”  I didn’t know this song so I was quite surprised when it turned out to be about 15 minutes long with multiple parts in very different styles.  It was pretty great, but would probably have been better if I was more familiar with it.

And that was that.  I was surprised that show that was so big turned out to be so short.  In retrospect I’m also surprised that he threw in so many covers (for a guy who has written so many songs).

I did enjoy the oversized nature of the band and show for sure.  But I see that he played Underground Arts just two years earlier for basically the same tour.  I think I would have preferred that show (even though Naked Giants wasn’t with them) because Toledo played guitar, they played “Vincent” and I imagine the crowd would have been a bit more understated (but maybe not–his fans are legion).

So I came away from the show mixed–feeling like I saw a great show, but not exactly sure I experienced a great show.  I hope my memory retains the good parts.

1. Waves of Fear (Lou Reed cover)
2. Bodys ⇔
3. Fill in the Blank ¥
4. (Joe Gets Kicked Out of School for Using) Drugs With Friends (But Says This Isn’t a Problem) ¥
5. Cute Thing ⇔
6. Sober to Death / Powderfinger (⇔/Neil Young cover)
7. America (Never Been) λ
8. Drunk Drivers/Killer Whales ¥
9. Destroyed by Hippie Powers ¥
10. Something Soon / Tell Me When My Light Turns Green (§/Dexy’s Midnight Runners cover)
11. encore
12. Beach Life-In-Death  (with an intro tease of “Vincent”) ⇔

¥ = Teens of Denial (2016)
⇔ = Twin Fantasy (2018) (originally 2011)
λ = How to Leave Town
§ = Teens of Style compilation (2015) (from My Back Is Killing Me Baby) (2011)