Live Review: Car Seat Headrest, Terrible Truths

Terrible Truths have a distinct, yelpy, proto-punk-meets-Saturday-morning-cartoons sound and they are so perfectly in sync with one another (particularly during See Straight and Uptight) that other bands are probably jealous.

A diverse crowd has rolled out for Car Seat Headrest, the musical project of Will Toledo. Most of the set draws from the last two albums, Teens Of Style and Teens Of Denial, with single Fill In The Blank popping up early to get the audience singing and dancing. There's a few curveballs, but these prove to be the most interesting facets of Car Seat Headrest's performance.

If you separate the lyrics from the music, it's astonishingly bleak. But Toledo and co just seem to make these depressing diary entries seem kinda fun thanks to their indie-rock charm. It's Drunk Drivers/Killer Whales  that the crowd loves most and the entire room chants every word louder than what's coming through the PA. The band are also somewhat famous for their live covers and we get a bit of The Velvet Underground's Sweet Jane before Car Seat Headrest faithfully tip their hats to Melbourne with a rather nice cover of Rowland S Howard's Shivers, which Toledo's voice is strangely perfect for.

They reemerge for an encore of Bodys and another cover (which they make their own) of obscure Pixies track Motorway To Roswell. And then it's all over way too soon. The set clocks in at under an hour in total and, considering the wealth of material Car Seat Headrest have to choose from, we're left feeling short-changed.