Hayden Anhedönia, better known as Ethel Cain, released a new EP titled Perverts on Jan. 8. Cain is a persona created by Anhedönia that inspired what a New York Times profile described as a “conceptual career.”
Multimedia artist Anhedönia plans on releasing three albums, three books, and three movies inspired by the character of Ethel Cain, according to that same article.
Perverts is the second release of the musical trilogy. The EP, however, is closer to an album in its runtime.
The name of her character brings to mind immediate religious imagery. “Cain” may be a reference to the story of Cain and Abel from the Bible, in which Cain commits the first murder. The link between religion and perversion is central to Anhedönia’s work, reflecting the gruesome nature of the Bible itself.
These religious themes are imbued in her latest album. The very first song, the titular “Perverts,” includes a reimagining of the hymn “Nearer, my God, to Thee.” Anhedönia uses audio distortion to highlight the unsettling spin on Christian imagery that will be used throughout the album.
Anhedönia’s work as Ethel Cain often deals with shame. This is especially seen through the tracks “Punish” and “Pulldrone.”
There are long stretches of instrumentals throughout the album. This creates an eerie, lonely tone, which is emphasized by lines such as “If you love me, keep it to yourself” from the song “Vacillator.”
In the previous track, “Houseofpsychoticwomn,” Anhedönia sings about her affection repeatedly. At first, she is hard to make out under the droning beat, but her voice gradually gets clearer. The other lyrics are also deliberately obscured by the music but don’t have the advantage of being repeated. This leaves only one clear message: “I love you.”
The message, paired with the title of the song, tells the audience exactly what the narrator thinks of love. She views it as a torturous thing. The artist also sings about being “Punished by love” in the aforementioned “Punish.”
In the song “Onanist,” Anhedönia sings, “I want to know love/I want to know what it feels like.” This references the dual themes of the album: love and addiction. The last song, Anhedönia clarified on her Tumblr, “is about throwing your life away to get high.”
With the lens of addiction, the last lines of “Onanist” take on a different tone. Anhedönia repeats, “It feels good/It feels good,” before ending the song on the inconclusive line “It feels.”
The tracks on Perverts span vast fields of emotion. Anhedönia effectively immerses the listener entirely into Ethel Cain’s world. The natural droning sounds and deliberate pace grounds the story.
This album is a departure from the more mainstream pop sound of Anhedönia’s previous album, Preacher’s Daughter. When asked about the change on Tumblr, Anhedönia replied that she simply liked drone music.
She elaborated on this sentiment in the announcement for Perverts, saying, “I’d also like to [thank] the natural drone music that exists everywhere in this world, in transformer boxes and powerlines on the side of the highway, in the radio static of an empty AM frequency … I love you, sound; you have always been there for me.”
Trial Track: Punish
Score: 8/10