Nervous Young Man

Nervous Young Man
Three small pictures on a white wall.
Cover used on streaming services.
Studio album by
Car Seat Headrest
ReleasedAugust 23, 2013
Genre
Length129:23
LabelSelf-released
ProducerWill Toledo
Car Seat Headrest chronology
Living While Starving
(2012) 		Nervous Young Man
(2013) 		Disjecta Membra
(2013)

Nervous Young Man is the eighth solo album by American musician Will Toledo released under the Car Seat Headrest alias. It was self-released via Bandcamp on August 23, 2013, and served as CSH's final album as a solo project.[1]

A double album, clocking in at two hours and nine minutes, it is the band's longest album to date. Described on Bandcamp as featuring "tracks written from ages 17 to 21", the album was conceptualized as a "greatest hits" album, despite being composed almost entirely of newly written material.[2] The title of the album and three of the tracks come from Toledo's high school project, Nervous Young Men.

Recording and release

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Toledo began recording Nervous Young Man following the release of Car Seat Headrest's seventh album, Monomania. While working on the album, Toledo shared several tracks on Soundcloud in the lead-up to Christmas 2012,[3] before officially announcing the album on Tumblr, on July 15, 2013.[4] Shortly before the album was scheduled to release however, the hard drive for Toledo's laptop crashed, resulting in a partial loss of the album.[5][6] In the following days, Toledo would reach out to those who had downloaded the tracks he previously shared on Soundcloud in order to finish uploading the album.[7] Despite this set-back, the album would be released on August 23, 2013, Toledo's 21st birthday.

Nervous Young Man would also be released alongside the outtakes compilation, Disjecta Membra, which was manually emailed out to anyone who purchased the album for five dollars or more within the first year of its release.[8][9] This compilation displays more of the vision Toledo had for the album as a "greatest hits", as many more re-recorded songs from the Nervous Young Men project are present on this additional release, such as "Napoleon (March into Russia)" or "Please Mr. Pilot".

According to Toledo, what would eventually become Car Seat Headrest's tenth album, Teens of Denial, began as a response to this record.[10] In an interview with Loud And Quiet, Toledo stated:

“I think people just had a hard time listening to it because it was so long, on a personal level, I kind of disliked it because a lot of the songs were more interested in songcraft than emotional engagement. I felt like I couldn’t engage with it as soon as the album was done. I struggle to make every song a deep reflection of myself and something I can connect to intimately. But that took a long time to come into shape, even though I know what I wanted to do. Usually knowing what you want to do does take longer to come into shape because you have to reject more material"[10]

Reception

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Sean Elliot of The Daily Album praised the record, specifically highlighting opener "Boxing Day", which they described as a 15-minute "coming of age epic" that moves "back and forth between acoustic guitar and vocal confessions, raucous, distorted electric rock interludes, drunken, reverberated rambles ala Johnny Cash, crunchy, electro rock, and somber organ and electronic percussion". Other highlights included "We Can't Afford (Your Depression Anymore)", "Don't Remind Me", "Afterglow", and "Plane Crash Blues (I Can't Play the Piano)".[11]

In a 2016 Reddit AMA, Toledo described the album as "a sleeper hit", adding "I don't know if anyone even listened all the way through at the time."[12]

Track listing

[edit]

All tracks are written by Will Toledo unless stated.

Nervous Young Man track listing
No.TitleLength
1."Boxing Day"15:35
2."We Can't Afford (Your Depression Anymore)"4:45
3."Don't Remind Me"4:45
4."Homes"6:41
5."Afterglow"5:04
6."Jerks"5:30
7."Broken Birds (Rest in Pieces)"8:22
8."The Gun Song" (contains lyrics and elements of the song "Down by the River", written by Neil Young)16:05
9."Goodbye Love"1:48
10."I Can Play the Piano"5:20
11."Crows (Rest in Bigger Pieces Mix)"4:24
12."I Wanna Sweat"5:52
13."Burning Man"5:33
14."Dreams Fall Hard"6:31
15."Plane Crash Blues (I Can't Play the Piano)"5:43
16."Big Jacket"5:05
17."Death at the Movies"6:54
18."Jus' Tired"5:27
19."Some Strange Angel"5:49
20."Knife in the Coffee" (contains lyrics of the song "Time Has Come Today", written by Joe Chambers and Willie Chambers)4:26
Total length:129:23

Personnel

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Car Seat Headrest

  • Will Toledo – all vocals and instrumentation, except:

Additional personnel

  • Amanda Schiano di Cola – trumpet (tracks 1, 14, 15, 18)[2]
  • Austin Ruhf – cello (track 8)

References

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  1. ^ "Bandcamp Got Car Seat Headrest Signed. Your Favorite Indie Act May Be Next". Inverse. 2015-12-10. Retrieved 2024-04-30.
  2. ^ a b "Nervous Young Man, by Car Seat Headrest". Car Seat Headrest. Retrieved 2024-04-30.
  3. ^ carseatheadrest. "CSHristmas Special". Tumblr. Retrieved 2024-06-10.
  4. ^ carseatheadrest. "car seat headrest". Tumblr. Retrieved 2024-04-30.
  5. ^ carseatheadrest. "car seat headrest". Tumblr. Retrieved 2024-06-10.
  6. ^ carseatheadrest. "hard drive is dead. died in the night". Tumblr. Retrieved 2024-06-10.
  7. ^ carseatheadrest. "car seat headrest". Tumblr. Retrieved 2024-06-11.
  8. ^ "Replay: Car Seat Headrest's 'Disjecta Membra' is a Buried Treasure | The Loyola Phoenix". 2024-04-17. Retrieved 2024-04-30.
  9. ^ carseatheadrest. "Nervous Young Man, by Car Seat Headrest". Tumblr. Retrieved 2024-06-10.
  10. ^ a b "Car Seat Headrest cover story: Will Toledo's 12-album overnight success story". Loud And Quiet. Retrieved 2024-04-30.
  11. ^ "Nervous Young Man by Car Seat Headrest | The Daily Album". 2016-06-23. Archived from the original on 2016-06-23. Retrieved 2024-04-30.
  12. ^ notcarseatheadrest (2016-05-06). "I started writing To…". r/indieheads. Retrieved 2024-06-10.
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