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Car Seat Headrest’s Will Toledo started wearing a mask long before March 2020. I know. How’s that for an opener?

The cornerstone of indie rock for the chronically online and lo-fi lovers alike are best known for their albums “Twin Fantasy” and “Teens of Denial,” and unmistakable bangers like “Sober to Death” and “It’s Only Sex.” With abrasively fuzzy instrumentals and perfectly male-manipulator lyrics, the band has made a cult following for themselves.

Their newest album "Making a Door Less Open" deviates from their standard sound and moves the band into a new era, and with that comes a new persona fronting the group.

For the uninitiated, Toledo’s recent on-stage schtick has involved performing in a gas mask (think somewhere in the middle of Darth Vader and Daft Punk, god rest their souls) marking his alter ego, Trait. He explains it as a way to be more himself on stage.

“I still get nervous being onstage with everybody looking at me,” he wrote on the band’s website, calling the mask a way to deflect, almost dissociate from the excruciating vulnerability of singing his songs in front of thousands of people. And hey, maybe even enjoy himself.

Of course, now that masks have become a regular part of our lives, Toledo’s once clairvoyant choice is now almost cliche, he laments, telling The New York Times, “It was supposed to be sort of an exotic alternative to reality — like a challenge, I guess, to normal life, And now it just feels a lot more pointed in a way that I wasn’t planning on and don’t really take any pleasure in.”

But “Making a Door Less Open” proved to be prophetic in other ways. In fact, Toledo spent most of 2019 incredibly sick, finding himself besieged by one virus or another while writing the album, which came out in mid-2020. “Weightlifters,” the opening track, is about “wanting to get out of the lethargy of an aging body,” Toledo told Entertainment Weekly. “Can’t Cool Me Down” is about being stuck in an extreme, almost euphoric fever state.

The album is something of a crossover between the original band and the side project of two members, Toledo and drummer Andrew Katz.

The project, 1 Trait Danger, is more reminiscent of EDM and exhibits much less of Car Seat Headrest’s stereotypical sad boy brand. You can hear these influences on Door Less Open with the two-minute long synth build-up that opens the album and the beats interlaced in the songs that follow. It’s an entirely new experience for Car Seat Headrest fans.

Car Seat Headrest, which hails from juuust down the road in Leesburg, Virginia, will be returning to the DMV April 2nd, performing at The Anthem with opener Bartees Strange. Whether you want to connect with Toledo's art through his new persona or just experience the dizzying satisfaction of hearing “Drunk Drivers/Killer Whales” screamed at you live and in concert, don’t miss out on the chance to snatch up GA tickets, going for only $35.