From its very title, ‘Perverts’ is not an album for the faint-hearted. On her debut album ‘Preacher’s Daughter,’ Ethel Cain (stage persona of Hayden Anhedönia) put the “cult” in “cult following” and emerged with the potential to be the next great indie darling. In her follow-up, she rejects the label entirely with 90 minutes of unsettling industrial noise and spectral vocals.
First off, ‘Perverts’ is a standalone project. It doesn’t build on the extensive lore of ‘Preacher’s Daughter’ or expand on the story of Ethel Cain. That said, the two projects are not entirely unrelated, as ‘Perverts’ intensifies the darker corners of Anhedönia’s debut. The most notable connection is with ‘Ptolemaea’ – the pivotal point of her first album where, with a blood-curdling scream, ‘Preacher’s Daughter’ transitions from a tragedy to an all-out horror. The ominous, muffled voices, doom-laden distortion and overarching sense of fear are amplified to the extreme. The result ranges from mildly unsettling to genuinely rather terrifying.
We open with ‘Perverts’, a 12-minute epic that dives in headfirst with a haunting, distorted recording of ‘Nearer My God To Thee’ before giving way to near-unintelligible voices, obscured by the soft, static roar of brown noise. ‘Housofpsychoticwomn’ evokes a similar nervous energy, the only audible words being ‘I love you’ and ‘I do’ amidst the low churn of static. In 90 minutes, there isn’t a moment of silence. All the way through you’re met with the distant whoosh of electrical noise or disconcerting scrapes and footsteps, punctuated with feedback and strange frequencies.
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Even where the focus strays from post-industrial production to the more lyric-focused ‘Punish’, it’s still not an easy ride. Building upon a soundscape of creaks and muffled piano chords, the track eventually yields to a wall of distortion that covers up the ghostly whisper of Cain’s vocals. ‘Vacillator’ and ‘Amber Waves’, arguably the most digestible of the nine songs, are centred more around the classic, ethereal vocals associated with Ethel Cain. Still, there is a sense that these songs are dampened, as if being heard underwater or from the next room.
The peak of the album, perhaps, is ‘Pulldrone’, a freezing cold, spoken-word descent into madness. Built from nothing but Anhedönia’s monotone voice and a buzzing, incessant drone that builds in urgency for 15 minutes, ‘Pulldrone’ is deeply disturbing in a way you can’t quite put your finger on.
On ‘Preacher’s Daughter’, there were moments like ‘American Teenager’ where you could separate yourself from the tragic lore and simply bask in alt-pop perfection. These moments are much harder to find on ‘Perverts’, ultimately making the album a tough pill to swallow for her ‘American Teenager’ fanbase. And that’s alright; not everyone wants to put on their headphones and experience abject terror for an hour and a half.
But the more hardcore members of the congregation who were transfixed by the darkness in the unholy trinity of ‘Ptolemaea,’ ‘August Underground’ and ‘Televangelism’ will feel right at home. ‘Perverts’ is not an easy album to listen to by any definition – but that never takes away from how exceptional it is.
9/10
Words: Vicky Greer
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