Car Seat Headrest Details New Concept Album ‘The Scholars’ & Confirms Tour Dates

Car Seat Headrest announced a new concept album, The Scholars, featuring the 11-minute lead single, “Gethsemane.” The band founded by frontman Will Toledo confirmed a batch of tour dates around the pending release set to arrive via Matador Records on May 2.

According to the announcement, the album is, “set at the fictional college campus Parnassus University [and] the songs on The Scholars are populated with students and staff whose travails illuminate a loose narrative of life, death, and rebirth.”

Produced by Toledo and recorded with his bandmates – lead guitarist Ethan Ives, drummer Andrew Katz and bassist Seth Dalby – The Scholars follows the band’s last album, 2020’s more experimentally beat-driven Making a Door Less Open. Challenges arising from the COVID pandemic and Toledo’s personal spiritual journey helped inform the pending record.

“One thing that can be a struggle with rock operas is that the individual songs kind of get sacrificed for the flow of the plot,” Toledo said. “I didn’t want to sacrifice that to make a very fluid narrative. And so this is sort of a middle ground where each song can be a character and it’s like each one is coming out on center stage and they have their song and dance.”

The band shared a music video for “Gethsemane” directed by Andrew Wonder. Describing “the character piece” that accompanies the 11-minute single, Car Seat Headrest collectively stated:

“Rosa studies at the medical school of Parnassus University. After an experience bringing a medically deceased patient back to life, she begins to regain powers suppressed since childhood, of healing others by absorbing their pain. Each night, instead of dreams, she encounters the raw pain and stories of the souls she touches throughout the day. Reality blurs, and she finds herself taken deep into secret facilities buried beneath the medical school, where ancient beings that covertly reign over the college bring forth their dark plans.”

Watch the “Gethsemane” video here:

Car Seat Headrest tour dates supporting The Scholars include an appearance at the Kilby Block Party in Salt Lake City on May 16. The band will then head to New York City for a performance at Governors Ball on June 7, followed by a show at The Anthem in Washington D.C. on June 28.

Car Seat Headrest performs at Mission Ballroom in Denver on July 12 and at Salt Shed in Chicago on July 26. The band then heads to The Greek in Los Angeles on August 8. September brings shows at Philadelphia’s Highmark Skyline at the Mann Center on September 12 and Boston’s MGM Music Hall on September 27. Car Seat Headrest also confirmed a performance at The Fox in Oakland on November 1.

Presale tickets go on sale starting Wednesday, March 5 at 10 a.m. local venue time. Tickets go on sale to the general public on Friday, March 7.

The Scholars Tracklist

1. CCF (I’m Gonna Stay With You)
2. Devereaux
3. Lady Gay Approximately
4. The Catastrophe (Good Luck With That, Man)
5. Equals
6. Gethsemane
7. Reality
8. Planet Desperation
9. True/False Lover