The album at #8 this year was a much-welcome surprise from Bacon Top 31 alum Car Seat Headrest. The Scholars is the unbelievably good 13th studio album from band, their first in five years, and it almost never came to be.

In October 2022, an ominous message came out from lead singer / songwriter / driving force Will Toledo: “After another month of struggling to regain my health, I am currently forced to face the fact that my body lacks the basic levels of functionality necessary to leave the house most days, let alone embark on a tour.” Earlier that year, on tour and finally able to promote 2020’s Making a Door Less Open (#10 that year), Toledo caught COVID-19. That eventually turned into what was thought to be symptoms of Long Covid, resulting in the October health issues and indefinite cancelations. Considering his health, the band even discussed breaking up for good. Fortunately, Toledo’s health started to improve in the Spring of 2023 after a diagnosis of histamine intolerance and a shift in diet, allowing the band to reconvene and start looking towards the future.

A couple years (and a live album, 2023’s Faces from the Masquerade) later, we get the prog-rock concept album The Scholars. The album circulates around eight characters at Parnassus University, a fictional college. The songs are all sung from the perspective of one of the characters. The band went deep on the lore behind these characters, releasing a statement:

“After an experience bringing a medically deceased patient back to life, [Rosa, the central protagonist,] 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.”

Thankfully, you don’t need to understand the story or how the lyrics string together to appreciate the majesty of this album. These nine songs meander through 71 minutes of music, taking myriad turns, ultimately the result of Toledo relinquishing his usual control over the band’s output, allowing for a joint effort in which everyone provides a piece of the puzzle. In addition to Toledo on most of the lead vocals, and rhythm guitar, Andrew Katz provides drums and background vocals, Seth Dalby is on bass and background vocals, and lead guitarist Ethan Ives takes the lead vocal role on a couple songs. These three gentlemen have been with the band since 2016’s Teens of Denial (at #7 that year), and through my previous favorite CSH album, Twin Fantasy (Face to Face) (#3 in 2018).

“CCF (I’m Gonna Stay With You),” the opening track on the album, is classic Car Seat Headrest: quiet slow intro slowly building into a frenzy that finally comes to a close eight minutes later. Check out the video for “Gethsemane,” featured above. At just under 11 minutes long, it’s my second favorite on the album. Some of the central themes in that song also show up two songs later, in “Planet Desperation,” my favorite track on the album, clocking in at just under 19 minutes long. You can watch their nearly hour-long KEXP Performance from August 2025, where they blow the socks off of DJ Cheryl Waters by playing both of those songs in full, live on the air.

I’m excited by the new “full band” experience Car Seat Headrest are presenting here on The Scholars. I got the sense on Making a Door Less Open, which in its own right a great album, but much more pop-hook driven and my least-loved (but still loved!) album from them in the last 10 years, that Toledo was nearing the end of his creative rope. Scholars has proven me wrong — in spades — and I can’t wait to hear where they collectively head next.