Will Toledo’s Car Seat Headrest has taken many strange musical paths across the past 15 years, beginning as a lo-fi bedroom rock project created by a bored, angsty teenager with a Bandcamp account and eventually developing into a stadium-filling, emotionally charged live act. This new single is yet another of those peculiar avenues, featuring cryptic lyricism, unusually ‘on-beat’ vocals and an interesting choice of synthesizers.
The standout element of the track is its lyricism, something long recognized as Toledo’s greatest strength. "You can love again / If you try again" feels right at home in the CSH catalogue, occupying a similar awkward emotional nook as 'Sober to Death'’s "Don’t worry / You and me won’t be alone no more". Advertised as a rock opera, The Scholars promises lengthy tracks that serve as character conversations, delivering emotional beats with an overarching narrative. Hopefully, this means that fans can expect more of Toledo’s brilliant songwriting throughout the album.
However, a few elements of the single are disappointing. The track’s pacing isn’t particularly strong, occasionally losing its way in search of the rise-and-fall catharsis that Toledo has mastered in the past. There’s a notable uncertainty in the transition between the soft opening and the rhythmic, drum-led middle section. It’s unusual to hear a track from the writer of ‘The Ending of Dramamine’ and ‘The Ballad of the Costa Concordia’ struggle to establish a compelling pace on an extended track. The vocal performance is also weak - Toledo’s usual stream-of-consciousness flow is replaced with an almost popish, robotic rhythm that doesn’t align with the lyrical content.
The main issue, strangely, is the track’s production. Toledo has produced every CSH album except for one – 2016’s Teens of Denial, which was helmed by Steve Fisk. It comes as a shock, then, that the production on ‘Gethsemane’ feels so flat – especially since it follows MADLO’s detailed, layered sound. This is most noticeable in the lack of impact from the stadium rock-esque drum fills. There doesn’t seem to be a foreground or background in the mix – something even 2012’s Monomania, a record mixed in Toledo’s bedroom, managed to achieve. A stronger mix could have significantly improved the song, making it especially frustrating to hear such a bland final product, given Toledo’s proven ability to craft intricate, multi-faceted production.
Everything in this article is spot-on, and as a huge CSH fan I'm glad someone finally said this. I'm hoping that the rest of the album doesn't have the same flatness as Gethsemane. I've heard the band has taken a more unified approach with this album, whereas even in the past few albums Toledo has remained the major creative source. I was excited to see some cool new stuff with the added input from the other band members, and I really hope they aren't a major source of flatness/pop-ishness on this album.