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Making a Door Less Open
Studio album by Car Seat Headrest
Released	May 1, 2020 (2020-05-01)
Recorded	January 2019 October 2019
Studio	Avast! (Seattle, Washington)
Genre	Indie rock electronic rock indietronica
Length	47:28
Label	Matador
Producer	Will Toledo Andrew Katz
Car Seat Headrest chronology
Commit Yourself Completely (2019) Making a Door Less Open (2020) Faces from the Masquerade (2023)
Singles from Making a Door Less Open
"Can't Cool Me Down" Released: February 26, 2020 "Martin" Released: March 23, 2020 "Hollywood" Released: April 16, 2020 "There Must Be More Than Blood" Released: April 23, 2020

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	77/100
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic
And It Don't Stop
Beats Per Minute	85%
Consequence of Sound	B
The Guardian
NME
Pitchfork	6.6/10
The Observer
Our Culture Mag
Rolling Stone

Making a Door Less Open is the twelfth album by American indie rock band Car Seat Headrest. It was released on May 1, 2020, via Matador Records. The album serves as the band's fourth for the label and the second to consist of newly written material.

Making a Door Less Open marks a distinct stylistic divergence from the band's previous material. While Car Seat Headrest largely became known for their indie rock sound and use of "lo-fi" aesthetics, the style of the album was largely influenced by experiments with 1 Trait Danger, the electronic side-project of band members Will Toledo and Andrew Katz.

Background

Writing for Making a Door Less Open began in January 2015, prior to the band's signing to Matador Records. Lead singer/songwriter Will Toledo began developing the songs electronically, with the ideas later being fleshed out into full songs in 2018. The first song conceived for the project would go on to become the opening track, "Weightlifters". Unlike previous Car Seat Headrest albums, Making a Door Less Open would end up being produced with more emphasis on the individual tracks, due to the increased prominence of streaming and playlists in modern music consumption. This would result in three separate versions of the album's track-list across release formats: vinyl, CD, and streaming.

Toledo, in an official write-up on the album titled "Newness and Strangeness", wrote, "The songs contain elements of EDM, hip hop, futurism, doo-wop, soul, and of course rock and roll. But underneath all these things I think these may be folk songs, because they can be played and sung in many different ways, and they're about things that are important to a lot of people: anger with society, sickness, loneliness, love."

Recording and release

In an August 2018 interview with Matt Wilkinson, Toledo confirmed that he was demoing out new material for the band, adding that, "there might be some stuff that surprises people who only know us as a rock band, but I don’t think it will come as a surprise to people who are checking out all the deep cuts". In January 2019, percussionist Andrew Katz confirmed the band was in the studio recording new music through a video uploaded on Instagram.

Following the tease of new music, the band began experimenting with new material at live shows, initially debuting the tracks "Weightlifters" and "Hollywood" at The Vera Project in December 2018. The band would also tease the song "Stop Lying to Me" as a part of their TIDAL documentary series, "I Haven't Done Sh*t This Year" in July 2019.

On February 3, 2020, Car Seat Headrest began sharing an abstract series of artworks created by Cate Wurtz on Twitter and Instagram, featuring mysterious captions. This continued throughout the month before concluding on February 26, 2020, when Making a Door Less Open was officially announced by the band, along with the release of the album's first single, "Can't Cool Me Down". The album's announcement also coincided with the introduction of "Trait", an alternative persona of Toledo's which had originally stemmed from the band's side-project, 1 Trait Danger. The character is presented wearing a gas-mask with LED eyes, and a hi-viz jacket and pants. Toledo explained his reasoning for introducing the character as the result of performance anxiety, and a wish to "remind and everyone else to have some fun with it."

"Trait" would go on to appear in the lyric video for the album's second single, "Martin", released on March 23, and the animated music video for the album's third single, "Hollywood", released on April 16.

Making a Door Less Open would officially release on May 1, 2020, the ten year anniversary of Car Seat Headrest's first album, 1. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the band's planned North American tour was cancelled, later being rescheduled to 2022.

Reception

Making a Door Less Open would receive generally positive reviews from critics. Jon Blistein of Rolling Stone would describe the album as "a well-executed experiment in cross-genre pollination that heightens Toledo’s best songwriting impulses — his humor, self-deprecation, cynicism and compassion." In a review for Under the Radar, Caleb Campbell would describe the album as a "disorienting listen," adding that it "feel like less of a holistic artistic statement than the band’s previous albums," but ultimately praised the band for their boldness to go in new directions. Rob Hakimian of Beats Per Minute credited the album for avoiding the "fatigue" induced by the run time of prior releases, and that the album was made compelling by "how each song manages to use different sonic approaches to extract a new shade of despondency".

In a more mixed review, Pitchfork's Ian Cohen would describe Making a Door Less Open as "mild disappointments and half-realized experiments lack the contrarian conviction that mints future cult classics", praising opener "Weightlifters," but describing single "Hollywood" as "both the laziest and most ruthlessly calculated thing done." Paste Magazine's Steven Edelstone would also describe the album as "the first legitimate misfire in the career of one of this generation’s most talented indie-rock songwriters."

While critical reception was generally positive, fan reception was more divisive, with fans noting the many divergences from the band's previous work. In an interview with Binaural, Toledo would discuss the album's reception, saying:

"I'm bummed at what some people are making of it, because most people don't follow my philosophy of approaching completely fresh, so they see it in terms of how they see the band already. But I just can't really counter that; to me, music is only exciting when there's the possibility of going anywhere with it."

In a 2023 interview with Stereogum, Toledo would note that he still liked the songs on the record, but felt that the release of the album coinciding with COVID lockdowns had left people feeling unreceptive to a "thorny" album.

Accolades

Track listing

All tracks are written by Will Toledo, except "Hollywood", written by Toledo and Andrew Katz.

Personnel

Credits are adapted from Bandcamp, and the album's vinyl liner notes.

Car Seat Headrest

• Will Toledo – vocals, synthesizers, keyboards, organ, guitar, piano, drum programming (on "Martin")
• Andrew Katz – drums, drum programming, vocals (on "Hollywood")
• Ethan Ives – guitars, vocals (on "Can't Cool Me Down" and "What's With You Lately")
• Seth Dalby – bass guitar

Additional musicians

• Gianni Aiello – guitar (on "Hollywood" and "There Must Be More Than Blood")
• John Huggins – violin (on "Can't Cool Me Down")

Production

• Will Toledo – production, mixing, engineering
• Andrew Katz – production, mixing, mastering (digital)
• John McRae – engineering
• Bernie Grundman – mastering (vinyl)
• Cate Wurtz – artwork

Charts

References

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• 2020 albums
• Car Seat Headrest albums
• Matador Records albums