Andrew Katz, a Multitalented Musician

The band Car Seat Headrest has been around for over a decade, gaining increased traction most recently with their song “Sober to Death” which made the rounds on TikTok this past summer. While many of Car Seat Headrest’s members have their own side projects, Andrew Katz’s side project, 1 Trait Danger, has had a major impact on the band’s stylistic evolution.

Andrew Katz, an Oregon born musician currently based in Seattle, boasts solo work that offers a much less serious style than Car Seat Headrest’s typical vibe. His sound can be best described as electronic rap music laced with comedic lyrics. Fans of Car Seat Headrest, also referred to throughout this article as Car Seat, may be confused by the contrasting sounds created by the same artists. Their most recent album, Making a Door Less Open, bridges that gap. 1 Trait Danger’s influence has always been a personal point of interest; luckily I was able to pick Katz’s brain to delve further into the artistic correlation between his musical projects.

We sat down over Zoom, and began by discussing the beginnings of his music career. Growing up, Katz meandered between a number of different groups – his “crews,” as he affectionately referred to them. He always had a particular affinity for sports, video games, and especially for music. Through this social exploration he became a jack of all trades – something that greatly benefited him as he experimented with his artistic pursuits. These experiences have kaleidoscopically crafted the persona he maintains to this day: a musical and nerdy jock. His journey to becoming a musician was a long and relatively unsteady one. Though he did get a bit of professional guidance, he never formally pursued lessons after quitting guitar as a kid. He repeatedly explained to me that he never liked the structure of them. It was clear to me that music for him wasn’t achievable if it was done out of obligation: music, to Andrew, can only be done if one feels a genuine passion for it. In college, he didn’t pursue music out of a sense of hesitation. He was worried that if it fell through, he’d have nothing to fall back on. Katz ended up majoring in (of all possibilities) Economics at the University of Oregon.
In 2012, a friend of Katz that lived in Seattle was in need of a roommate. He knew if he wanted to take his life as a musician more seriously, he’d need to move to a bigger city, so he seized the opportunity. He worked during the day as a research assistant (putting that major to work!), and played gigs by night. He didn’t have any music connections at the time, and was meeting people off Craigslist to “jam with,” as he so simply put it. His main project before Car Seat was called Lost Tribe, a band he described as “an electronic, indie, dance-y group.” Katz noted that it introduced him to a more digitally charged music scene than he was used to; his Craigslist hunts continued, and eventually landed him his role in Car Seat Headrest. After lead singer Will Toledo responded to one of his ads, the two “jammed … and that was the beginning.”
The first Car Seat Headrest album he was a part of was Teens of Style, of which he said he contributed “literally zero creative input” to. He played drums and described the process as Toledo “[coming] over to [his] house and [recording] drums haphazardly in [the] garage.” These hometown-esque foundations became the basis for Katz’s booming professional career. Teens of Style was Car Seat Headrest’s first album signed to Matador Records, something that sounds evident in the boost in production quality and some of the lyric remasterings (“Times to Die” in particular). When asked about being signed, and how that felt, Katz said that, “it’s a big thing for a band to be signed. When it happened it was obvious that things were going to change, and that things were gonna go up from there.”
And up they went indeed.
The band quickly gained traction, releasing their next album Teens of Denial in 2016, and the remastering of what is widely considered by fans to be Will Toledo’s magnum opus: 2018’s Twin Fantasy. On the day of Twin Fantasy (Face to Face)’s release, 2.16.18, Andrew Katz’s first solo album dropped. 1 Trait Danger’s first album, 1 Trait High, marks a special turning point in Katz’s career: his solo project became a bigger priority.
1 Trait Danger is a special kind of silly. While funny, it has intent as well as musical integrity. The production quality is excellent and the melodies are fun. Every song’s lyrics tell a specific, character driven story. Katz says that 1TD (as it’s endearingly called by Katz and fans alike) is “a sort of comedic look at what life as a musician is, in a really strange way.” He specifically notes the themes of touring, and “not knowing what city you’re gonna wake up in.” He continued earnestly, saying it’s “all lived experience – and making comedy about it.”. The characters are created in order to capture these themes as well as Katz’s own personality. Earlier I mentioned his somewhat oxymoronic “nerdy jock musician” personality: this shines through brightly in 1 Trait Dangers music, in which the roles are reversed and songs are written in a universe where “strength means nothing—[and] it’s all about who’s best with computers.” He gives an example, where “the bully steals your Bitcoin and hacks your computer instead of beating you up”. He attributes the style he developed to his time working with Lost Tribe. He said that if he hadn’t met Lost Tribe, he doesn’t think he ever would’ve gotten into music production at all and cites them as the push he needed to create 1TD. Through Andrew Katz, Lost Tribe entwines Car Seat Headrest entwines 1TD.
The first indication that 1 Trait Danger’s style had bled into Car Seat Headrest’s is on Twin Fantasy (Face to Face). At the end of the song “Bodys”, lyrics are interpolated from 1 Trait Danger’s song, “Oh Actually”. The inclusion of a rhythmic and repeated monologue marks the first occurrence of Katz’s specific multi-project influence. When I asked Katz about this, and how he managed to mesh his two worlds, he said that he didn’t: Will Toledo did. One day they were driving together, and Toledo put on a “new version of Bodys”. The band liked the idea of connecting 1TD and Car Seat Headrest, of which Katz refers to as “a deepcut thing for hardcore fans.” That small detail isn’t the end of Katz’s influence though, their most recent album Making a Door Less Open being essentially a full collaborative album of the two acts. Making a Door Less Open, or MADLO as it’s more colloquially referred to, is a hard left turn for Car Seat Headrest’s style. Introducing a far more electronic sound than is expected based on their prior work, MADLO reflects more of Katz’s characteristic sound. This evolution is primarily due to the band's adoration and excitement about 1TD, and the introduction of Katz into a producing role.
Unfortunately, fan reception of the album was less than stellar. When asked how this reaction made him feel, Katz said “obviously, not good,” with a laugh. He “[doesn’t] want to hear people say they don’t like it.”
Katz did however notice a difference in reception between older and newer fans: previously established fans didn’t like it. “That fact just goes to show that people hate change,” Andrew said. “[Older fans] want the band to put out the album exactly how they remember it. They want Car Seat to be Car Seat forever, [and] never want the sound to change.”
He doesn’t anguish for long, though, being comforted by the knowledge that “there are always gonna be people like that when you put out a new sound … It was very heartening to see the new fans, and the young fans, loving the songs. Especially ‘Hollywood’ which people love to hate”. (“Hollywood” was a huge point of contention among fans, due to its abrasive sound. Katz once again attributes the hate as “just people hating change.”)
So, what’s next for Katz and the band? After a string of tour cancellations due to Will Toledo’s COVID-related health problems, fans were concerned for the band’s future. Good news, though! “He’s been recovering slowly... and the last time [Katz] talked to him, [Toledo] said he was feeling a lot better.” While “he’s definitely not 100% yet, he seems to be trending upwards.”
Another exciting reveal from Katz is that, “the Car Seat Boys are getting ready to record the new album.” In fact, they just recently met up to practice some of Will’s new demos. He wants fans to know that the recording process for the next album is starting. Andrew Katz wanted to clarify, however, that fans “should not hold their breath…because albums take a while to put together.” The album may be delayed just a bit further, with Katz specifically working on a new project.
1 Trait Danger’s success inspired Andrew Katz to explore his world- and character-building in a unique way. Cossett’s World and Lombardi’s World are two video games, coded and released by multi-dimensional Katz. Both games take original characters that capture Katz’s experiences in life, the music industry, and everything in between. The process of creating these games was taxing, Andrew “slammed [him]self into the ground,” creating them, and worked “way too many hours a day” to complete them. He described the pride he felt about finishing the games, saying that “making a video game is really hard… a lot harder than making an album, and it’s a lot less rewarding in the moment.” Katz goes on to say that “making a video game is only rewarding when it’s done, while making music can be fun [throughout] the whole process … [in the end,] it just feels really good to have a finished product and to have something that you made that people are enjoying.” He’s currently working on a new addition to his developing repertoire called 1 Trait Escape. This time he has taken it much easier on himself, employing a team to keep him from working himself to the bone.
Andrew Katz is a delightful interviewee, video game developer, and musician. Video game and Car Seat Headrest fans alike should follow his next moves, both in the music and coding arenas of his life. If you’re a part of the latter, check out 1 Trait Danger for some fun (that fueled my writing process), and Car Seat Headrest for some music that I genuinely believe to be some of the best ever performed. And, if you’re a member of the former, be on the lookout for the release of 1 Trait Escape, “coming out, God knows when… Sometime, someday, somewhere.”