How 'Car Seat Headrest' Frontman Will Toledo Confirmed He's A Furry After Years Of Memes And Speculation

On March 31st, Car Seat Headrest’s frontman Will Toledo confirmed years of ongoing speculation and memes about him being a furry by going on stage at Brooklyn Steel and performing their song 'Bodys' in a fursuit. Photos of the show went viral on Twitter. One photo in particular, showing Toledo standing on stage in the suit and his electronic gas mask adorned with bunny ears (something he’s been wearing for the entirety of the latest tour) is captioned, “ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME,” the poster in apparent shock over what they’re seeing.

Toledo went a step further confirming the news in a tweet the following day where he shared the full fursuit, a bunny named Mortis created by Jill Costumes, writing, “Since this is officially News now: here's the full guy. I love him & many thanks to @jillcostumes for bringing him to life.” This monumental moment in Car Seat Headrest’s history acts as a final bookmark to the longstanding memes and speculation surrounding the band’s frontman, who has been suspected to be a furry for years now in what has to be one of the most blatantly open secrets in musical history.

The speculation about Will Toledo being a furry largely took off with a 2017 post to Fur Affinity. In the post, the user writes, “I'd suspected for quite a while that Will Toledo of the band Car Seat Headrest is a furry,” then links to a now-defunct (but archived) profile on the website with the handle “carseatheadrest.” Another link (also archived) leads to the full, extended album artwork and liner notes for the band’s 2011 album My Back Is Killing Me Baby, uploaded by the same user, featuring a few drawings of an anthropomorphic wolf. The poster goes on to give further reasoning for their speculation, citing how Car Seat Headrest often features anthropomorphic animals in their album art and offering the lyrics from their song "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Fag" as another piece of evidence. The lyrics go:

“My fingerprints are getting burned off
From using the too hot touchpad
Of my MacBook Pro
As I casually scroll through
The fetish-based forum
Of which I am an active member
I promise I will never use the term anthro-fiction
When describing your body of work”

This evidence acted as all the proof many Car Seat Headrest fans needed to confirm Toledo’s status as a furry despite Toledo never directly confirming it. As the rumors spread, though, people began digging up further evidence to support the theory. The band once performed a song "I Want To Be Covered In Fur" that talks about exactly that, many seeing it as a reference to wanting to be a furry.

The band’s cult hit album Twin Fantasy, features an image of two anthropomorphic animals hugging. Allegedly, the album is about a relationship and breakup Toledo went through with an ex-boyfriend, supposedly a furry artist. It features the song "Beach Life-In Death." In the song, Will sings:

“I pretended I was drunk when I came out to my friends
I never came out to my friends
We were all on Skype
And I laughed and I changed the subject
She said, "what's with this dog motif?"
I said,​ "do you have something against dogs?"

The lyrics reference a Tumblr post made by Will where he writes almost exactly this, regaling a moment where he seemingly changes the subject to avoid outing himself as a furry. Toledo has been public about his social anxiety and nervousness to interviewers in the past, as well as his stage fright. This is a big reason why he started wearing the gas mask during the latest tour. The gas mask ultimately represents Toledo’s alter ego, Trait, who he performs as under his side-act with drummer Andrew Katz (also a speculated furry) 1 Trait Danger, a band that overtly features furries on the album art. Toledo’s anxiety was seemingly a large factor that kept him from fully embracing his love for anthro art and furry culture in the past. Now, after going on the road as Trait and finding ways to better manage his anxiety, Toledo has found a way to fully embrace his love of furry culture in the public eye.

The speculation about Toledo’s furry status has inspired piles of memes in the Car Seat Headrest community, becoming one of the dominant recurring memes among fans. The memes make reference to the album art, the overt clues Toledo has shared over the years and the fans themselves, framing the band’s music as “furry music” despite its wide range of appeal. Mostly the memes come off harmless. They were fuelled by the “secrecy” about Toledo’s status as a furry. His nervousness to fully confirm whether or not he’s a furry egged people on, almost trying to push the answer out of the man through humor. Of course, the memes didn’t stop when he started to get more public about it in 2020 – they only got bigger.

Toledo has been more and more direct with his hints about being a furry in recent years, really laying it all out there in 2020. That year he commented on a YouTube cover of his song “Martin” performed by a furry named Scurrow, writing, “YES!!! Thank you for uploading! I love your singing & the trumpet part!” That same year he did an interview with Bandcamp where he named some of his favorite Bandcamp musicians, the top two being furry artists. In the interview, he says, “I’ve been on the sidelines of the furry community for about 10 years--that was where I started off sharing my music,” which many saw as confirmation that he used to share his music on Fur Affinity. That August he made it very clear that he was a furry during a Reddit AMA where one user asked, “Hey Will are you still a furry,” answering a simple, “yes.” The secret was all but out at this point, but the fans still seemed eager for something more solid. That solid confirmation came this year at Brooklyn Steel, where Toledo came out on stage in his bunny fursuit and played a song to thousands, including at least one audience member in a full fursuit who crowd surfed during the tune in a moment one Twitter user regales as a "fever dream.”

Being a furry can be tough. They get a bad rap on and offline, so it's no surprise a musician with such a massive online fandom wouldn't want to go public about being one. But seeing Toledo in the full fursuit was exactly what fans of the band, especially furry fans, needed to finally put to rest the speculation. It wasn’t just a string of text in an AMA or a lyric of a song but a full embracement by Toledo of furry culture, showing his pride to all in a context finally outside of a computer monitor. For anyone who vibes with Car Seat Headrest’s music and the music’s overt themes about nervousness and anxiety, this moment is an important one that shows us Toledo is finally comfortable enough to step out of his shell and let the people in on one of the more intimate parts of his existence. He may not wear the fursuit on stage again and the memes will likely never end, but Toledo has made an important step forward by going on stage in his fursuit at all, spreading courage to some of his most dedicated fans in the process who might now feel more comfortable embracing their furry side.