Song Review: ‘Hollywood’ By Car Seat Headrest

Car Seat Headrest is serving up Holden Caulfield realness in their latest single ‘Hollywood’. While the artsy-kid-chewed-up-and-spat-out-by-the-corrupt-system narrative is nothing new, frontman Will Toledo manages to breathe new life into the trope, expressing internal anxieties, as well as sharp criticisms of the entertainment industry.

Alongside their earlier single ‘Can’t Cool Me Down’, ‘Hollywood’ represents a sonic departure from the indie rock roots of breakout album Teens of Denial, or their most recent studio record, Twin Fantasy (Face to Face). The band has clearly been influenced by hip hop production styles, opting for a more percussive sound with an emphasis on Toledo, and drummer Andrew Katz’s shouted vocals.

The song won’t be completely alien to fans of the band – an absolute banger of a riff reaffirms Car Seat Headrest’s position on the frontline of modern indie rock. Several Toledo-isms find their way into the track, including a fixation on art, snippets of a faltering falsetto and a narrative voice defined by adolescent immaturities, like the chorus’s poetic mantra that “Hollywood makes me wanna puke.”

However, Car Seat moves beyond these trademark characteristics to deliver a song that grapples with pertinent issues. Beyond the appearance of emotionally stunted lyrics, lie themes of fame, youth and obsolescence, delivered through a tone of disgust and disillusionment. Toledo’s anxiety-ridden worldview is on full display in lines like, “Everywhere I go, I’m oppressed by these energies.”

But the song’s repulsion isn’t focused inward like the band’s previous work, with the lyrics instead aiming at the broader culture of Hollywood itself, as is evident in the final portion of the song. Taking a dark turn, the song calls out the seedier aspects of an entertainment industry built on a foundation of exploitation, evoking the concerns of the #MeToo movement and reflecting the typical anti-fame stance of many indie bands that hit the big time.

Ultimately, Car Seat Headrest provides a sonically ambitious takedown of the entertainment industry in an abrasive track that, while a departure from the band’s sound, maintains the spirit of previous Car Seat projects. ‘Hollywood’ is an idiosyncratic single that rejects being tied down by genre or fame, boding well for the band’s upcoming album, Making a Door Less Open, releasing May 1.