Inbred EP by Ethel Cain | Album Review
Hayden further develops her more aggressive tragic sound on her second EP.
Hayden Anhedönia, who goes by the stage name Ethel Cain, began to really shape her sound into the Americana-tinged indie pop on her second EP Inbred. She shed the heavy reverb and Shoegaze tones in exchange for a more classic rock edge. This marries beautifully with the bleak and often traumatic lives of the destitute southern American. Her discussion with Morbidly Beautiful highlights where depths of generational trauma that outline her debut album Preacher’s Daughter started:
“In the same vein as the overarching theme for the debut record I’ve been tirelessly working on, I’m deeply engrossed in the idea of generational trauma and skeletons in closets. “The sins of the father” and all that. It’s where “Daughters of Cain” came from in the first place. The idea that something your great-great-grandfather did 100 years ago can still fuck you up; those deeply rooted issues in your family that never get resolved and are just further inbred into your bloodline with each generation, twisting and turning and contorting until it rips you all apart.”
Hayden opens the album with western-inspired alt-pop “Michelle Pfeiffer.” The dusty sound of the guitar melody adds a sense of urgency to this faltering love. Anhedönia recruits rapper/songwriter Lil Aaron to add a verse on the song.
She told Morbidly Beautiful she was excited to make something more pop-oriented with this track:
“It was exhilarating! I’ll be the first to admit I can have a whole stick up my ass regarding my own music and image, I don’t really do humor and I definitely take the art a little too seriously sometimes, so it was nice to just make something fun for once. To just get in the booth, let loose, and make a pop song. It wasn’t even originally on the EP but after a solid month of listening to the demo and getting gradually more obsessed with it, I texted Aaron and I was like, ‘can I please have this for the EP, it’s too good’ haha.”
Both artists play well off one another. Cain’s yearning vocals and Aaron’s sense of apathy bring the teenage angst to a rolling boil. Hayden’s words in the song’s bridge, “I’m all run and you’re all fight/ Tangling with Jesus Christ/ Total ruin idolized/ But the kids will be alright,” ignite this harbinger of doom that these kids will have to fight with constantly.
We open into Ethel’s allure towards the bad boy on “Crush.” Hayden keeps some of the dreamy elements that were present on her prior EP while adding an alternative grit with her bass work and the more bare drum beat. In the opening verse, she casts this man in a dangerous light: "His daddy’s on death row/ But he’ll say it with his chest, though/ His friends move dope/ He hasn’t tried coke/ But he’s always had a problem saying no.”
Despite his flair for illegal activities, she can’t help but fall head over heels for him. It’s understandable as to why the track was chosen to be the lead single from this project. Its dangerous yet sexy vibe will immediately draw you in. Anhedönia has brought this track out as a closer for her 2023 tour to much fanfare.
We continue with the imagery of sin, poverty, fear, and defiance on “God’s Country.” Anhedönia brings in singer/songwriter and producer Wiccan Phase Springs Eternal to add a verse to the track. Hayden told Hero Magazine that the song went through several iterations before settling on the final version:
“It’s like the tenth version of the song… I wrote the song back in September [2020], right after I moved to the church. I hit up my friend Adam and asked if he wanted to be on the song, that I had a verse and a chorus written… I had written so many different versions — it was five minutes, then it was ten and a half minutes, then it was eight minutes. I was just never satisfied, it kept breathing and growing with me. Over the course of the EP, I had no idea what I wanted from it. So then finally, three days before the final mixes were due, I started over from scratch. I think all I kept was the piano, and I wrote something completely new. I put it all together in one night — I wrote new lyrics, did new vocals, all of it. I was just like, “Fuck it, this has to be the final version.” It was a whirlwind of a song.”
The song is by far the longest on the EP, coming in at a little over 8 minutes. This slow burner has a retro flavor through its warm synth line that really erupts into sparks of color by the end of the track. Anhedönia really dives into the scars of generational trauma and poverty through lines like, “Our kids will grow up with half as much/ Trying to build something out of dust/ Finding out too late what they need.” While the gloss synths bring to mind the richness of 80s pop, this feels more like an empty, dilapidated business whose fading neon lights shine a light on what once was and could have been.
“Unpunishable” brings to mind the thick, dirty alternative rock sound of “Gibson Girl” from her debut album. The sound works fantastically against the used and brutal sexuality that Anhedönia tears forth from the start. The thick bass and 80s hard rock sound bring to squalor and rage.
The lines, “The darker the fruit, the sweeter/ I ask him if he’s ok with that/ He’s mean, I’m meaner/ My baby says that he’s not afraid of that,” act as an omen for the struggle she will constantly have to fight against to maintain power in this relationship. It’s visceral.
By far the darkest song on the album comes from the title track, “Inbred.” The song details the very painful childhood that Cain’s character endured and how her oftentimes outcast troublemaking brother was her savior. Hayden told Pitchfork the following about the emotions that surrounded this track:
“When I was writing it, it was me and my thoughts. I was in my room here in January… And if I’m alone for too long, I start to get in my head about things I don’t like getting in my head about. There’s definitely a very personal frustration on “Inbred.” Just kind of recalling shit from childhood that you didn’t really understand at the time and now it comes back and you’re like, “Whoa.” I had all this stuff running through my head about different times that people in my life failed me or did things they weren’t supposed to do. And I was angry. I was like, “You’ve put me in this place that I’m going to have to spend the rest of my life trying to get out of, and I don’t know if I ever will.” A lot of times in order to not feel things so strongly, I have to put them into songs. It’s like an exorcism: Let me pull it out, put it in a box, lock it up, and not have to deal with it anymore because now it’s happening to the girl singing the song and not me.”
Hayden builds in her acidic anger from a meek coo to an absolute explosion of sound and energy by the song’s end. Where “Unpunishable” is caustic, “Inbred” is harrowing. Hayden’s ability to conjure the horrific brokenness of this woman hits you hard in the gut. She clings to her brother for protection against the brutal abuse she must endure. It’s the most intense song in all of Ethel’s catalog.
The final track on the EP, “Two-Headed Mother,” goes in a miasmic, psychedelic route with its funky guitar work. The kind of sound brings to mind a dingy motel room in ill repair. This two-headed mother metaphor (one side the nurturer and the other succubus) gives depth to the theme of being able to make and unmake a man at her will. The grit and sexuality of the guitar adds to the sharp thorns of this rose. Hayden’s ragged spoken words drag their nails now your body with each line. It’s a very effective closer to bringing together the themes of darkness throughout this project.
Compared to Hayden’s debut EP Golden Age, Inbred feels much more fleshed out both sonically and thematically. Her marriage of classic rock, dream pop, Americana, and alt-rock give much depth to her themes of impoverished living and brutalized lifestyles.
While separate from what will become her debut Preacher’s Daughter, I can hear the beginnings of the conceptual center of that album. I really couldn’t find anything that stood out as something I disliked about this project. Her lyricism and sound have grown wonderfully from the first EP. This isn’t an album to play for an upbeat experience.
That said, it’s perfect for releasing emotions to. I hope this one day gets a physical release (such as vinyl or a wider released CD), as it deserves this treatment. I highly recommend listening to this EP if you loved her debut album or any dark alt-pop. My overall thoughts on this album:
Loved it: “Michelle Pfeiffer” (feat. Lil Aaron), “Crush,” “God’s Country” (feat. Wiccan Phase Springs Eternal), “Unpunishable,” & “Inbred.”
Liked it: “Two-Headed Mother.”
Disliked it: None
My overall rating: 8 out 10.
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