Ethel Cain - Perverts (Review)

 

Watch my first video review above, or read the transcript below!

Text Review:

In 2022, Hayden Anhedönia (aka Ethel Cain) left her mark on the singer-songwriter scene with the monumental *Preacher’s Daughter*, a record driven by its poignant explorations of poverty and vices in the Deep South. It was an intense listen elevated by a rich and varied instrumental palette which pulled as much from her contemporaries in dream country as it did from slowcore, although it was the album’s devastating storytelling which awarded it a position amongst many people’s favourite albums of 2022, myself included. So, how did Ethel Cain choose to follow such an album?

Well, with a 90 minute “EP” pulling from dark ambient and drone music, Ethel Cain is stepping confidently out from the “singer-songwriter” umbrella and into the pouring rain. This project is dark - the shimmering synths and gothic Americana guitars are absent, and the colourful songwriting takes a backseat to the repetitive waves of depressive piano, droning noise, and only occasional synth accents. The result of this stylistic pivot is a punishingly expansive ambient record that conjures an apocalyptic atmosphere in which Hayden is comfortably uncomfortable, offering a surprising intimacy through her sparse vocal presence on the album, without which the album’s melancholic droning provides little warmth.

In fact, it is in this juxtaposition which the album succeeds, the cold expanse of the instrumentals contrasting the soft touch of Hayden’s alluring vocals to deliver a balance which evokes the album’s core thematic tenet. Her lyrics touch on many of the same themes which characterised *Preacher’s Daughter*, the same rural poverty and desperation backdrops the search for pleasure which runs central to the record, with the different characters in Hayden’s life and background looking for that elusive feeling in different places, whether it be found in drugs, in exercise, in masturbation, in relationships, or in God. This bright flash of divine pleasure is alluded to more than it is represented in the music, a climax beyond the current moment - but the means with which it is achieved may be the very thing which restricts it to a moment, before the shuddering weight of the world returns to obscure that path, the layers of noise which crescendo on a song like “Vacillator” fading away into the quiet lull of its instrumental drone.

This album is not going to appeal to everyone, although I’ve been thrilled to see so many of Ethel Cain’s fans embracing this new direction, even if it may appear tangential in her discography when we get that next official “album” - regardless, if you are looking for a dark examination of sex and the divine, this is an album which executes its themes exceptionally well. It doesn’t have the replay value of *Preacher’s Daughter*, and its content doesn’t match that album’s overall emotional depth and impact, but it is a deeply authentic foray into ambient music and I found a lot more to connect to than I would expect from a project like this.

Favourite Songs: 'Punish', 'Vacillator', 'Onanist', 'Amber Waves'

Least Favourite: 'Houseofpsychoticwomm'

Score: 8.2/10

Ethel Cain - Perverts - 8 Jan 2025 - Daughters of Cain