The Pop Corporation

What do you do when you’ve amassed an adoring, fevered set of fans and you need to occasionally tell them off? It’s something we’ve seen with Chappell Roan, and so too, with Ethel Cain, who is an underground sensation, now gently bursting overground.

Before you even get to the music, you’re aware that there’s been extracurricular activities, with dubious characters trying to get some cancel culture going by dredging up old nonsense in bad faith which the artist addressed and promptly moved on from.

There’s also been written thoughts, including the frustration of too many people trying to turn Cain into a meme, while the Republicans with the thinnest of skin shrieked and hollered for taking some kind of stance regarding the offing of wealthy CEOs.

From these distractions came an abstract, some-call-it ambient album, and now, a more traditional outing called ‘Willoughby Tucker, I’ll Always Love You’, which we’re told, will be the end of the Ethel Cain persona, exploring the gothic underbelly of the United States, and the fringe ideas of society.

All this is to say that Ethel Cain is a very interesting and intriguing person to have around, and while big ticket acts can often fall foul of the kowtowing to the algorithm and the resultant beige-ification of pop-culture, we need to value these unique characters.

What we find is something like an independent road movie through the weeds and deserted lots of the US, with warm drones acting like humming aircon, and Americana twangs akin to Ry Cooder and, to a lesser degree, the half-dream state of the Twin Peaks soundtracks.

Lead single ‘Nettles’ is a perfect showcase for what’s in store, haunted and layered, while still being achingly gorgeous.

What’s so interesting sonically, is the switch between a tender, ethereal falsetto, and the bruised, seductive alto, and throughout, absolute zingers that will draw you right in to the stories, like “I know she’s your girl now, but she was my girl first.”

We’re told of Ethel Cain and the break-up with the titular Willoughby Tucker, and all the mess and emotion that it entails. It’s not all bruised emotion and lowered eyes – there’s enough rousing musical elements to provide variety.

With ‘Fuck Me Eyes’, you’re served a gothic, neon synth anthem that to our ears, gives us what Industrial Music always promised but never delivered. It’s slinkier, sexier, and filled with anticipation rather than tedious dread.

You hear “she really gets around town in her old Cadillac in her mom’s jeans that she cut to really show off her ass”, making way for “she goes to church straight from the clubs – they say she looks just like her momma before the drugs.”

Where we’ve been itching to enjoy the music of Lana Del Rey and her flirtation with blue collar, problematic America, it turns out that the real interesting stuff may have been under our noses the entire time. While comparisons are often unfair and usually pretty lazy, there’s been a need for someone to skewer Real America, with both fondness and a critical eye, and it looks like this is just the album to do it.

Cain’s lyrics are the real stand-out in what is a very strong album. In one moment, you’re swooning with nostalgia with pedal steel and strings, the next, your hair stood on end while you listen to “drive-in slasher flick again – feeling me up as a porn star dies”.

It’s an album that’s emotionally intense, but it isn’t emotionally overwrought – it’s riveting stuff, turbulent, and feels in places, almost like a documentary playing out before your eyes.

Such is the feverish adoration of Ethel Cain, it is easy to try and resist the talent Hayden Anhedönia shows. We’re late to the party for precisely that reason, and it’s our loss. We’re aware that the lore in this LP will enrich the narration for listeners – and while we’re going to have to find that out for ourselves, this is still able to stand on its own without it.

The cinematography of this album makes you wonder if someone should option this into a series of films, because so canny is Anhedönia in this Ethel Cain guises, the lack of this on screen is more of a slight on the state of modern cinema than anything else. The stories in this record are likely to swallow you whole, if you’re willing to let them.

If this is how this particular chapter ends, we’re eager to see how the next story begins.