Ethel Cain’s Perverts Encourages an Experience That Transcends Traditional Music Listening
Perverts is not your traditional album. Do not go into this expecting a collection of rhythms, vocal and instrumental motifs, and metaphorical lyrics. Perverts is experimental and expands the listener’s idea of what music, and more importantly, what sound can achieve. Ethel Cain, the ever-allusive American singer-songwriter and record producer, presents listeners with a haunting escape from reality. With a runtime of 1 hour and 29 minutes and a total of 9 songs, Cain tests the limits of her songwriting and artistry. With a handful of songs having no lyrics at all, Cain achieves storytelling through sound like only a handful of artists have.
The title track, “Perverts” sets the tone. With a twelve-minute runtime, Cain is nothing if not ambitious. A faint humming sound in the background carries the song through its final moments and weaves in and out of other indistinguishable instrumental and drone sounds. Deep grumbling noises, like a storm creeping over a hillside, and robotic beeps break up the constant wind-like whistle. You feel stranded in a barren desert, the wind blowing through your hair and sand scratching at your skin. The track is meditative but unsettling at the same time, like you are at the precipice of something, but Cain does not quite reveal her secret just yet.
Perverts album cover shot by Marlee Kula, @marlsbarklee
“Punish” is hollow and bleak, with a slow piano introduction followed by ethereal vocals that sing poetic lyrics: “Whatever's wrong with me/I will take to bed/I give in so easy/Nature chews on me/Little death like lead/Poisonous and heavy/It has always been this way.” Her lyricism is tortured and punctuated by the generational and religious trauma that she has braided into her work. The song concludes with the painful repetition of “I am punished by love.” A scratchy instrumental breaks the melancholic but peaceful instrumentals thus far to reflect the damage that love has inflicted upon her. This theme gently floats through the entire album as Cain explores the relationship between her past and present self.
Directors: Hayden Anhedonia & Silken Weinberg, Director of Photography: Joanna Nguyen, First Assistant Camera: Mike Gunetong, Gaffer: Ant Boyd, Key Grip: Pauli Dandino, Editor: Hayden Anhedonia, Special Thanks to Marlee Kula & Michael O'Meara.
Perverts continues almost imperceptibly, with “Houseofpsychoticwomn,” a track that opts for experimental vocals over traditional lyrics. Drone sounds and buzzing instrumentals build throughout the song, crescendoing toward an aggressive, and almost violent, back-and-forth sound, like a slinky bounding in slow motion, or like what I would imagine pent-up energy to sound like if it were trapped in a dark room. This is not to say the track is not effective at stirring your deepest emotions. More than any track on the album, “Houseofpsychoticwomn” forces you to confront your pain and the tortured parts of your mind and soul.
Cain finds a heartbeat in the following track, “Vacillator.” Built out with more drums, drone sounds, and complex lyrics, “Vacillator” is eerie and magnetic. Matthew Tomasi, a producer based in Toronto, slowly works with drums to build to a slow but steady rhythm that Cain pairs with brutal lyrics: “You're so smooth/If you want, you can bite me/And I won't move/You won't lose me to thunder or lightning/But you could to crowded rooms.” Vocal layering adds an ethereal quality to Cain’s voice and gives the song an unsettling undertone that holds your attention. What might seem like a continuation of the album’s eerie instrumentals and ambiguity is the beginnings of something new taking form. Cain’s talent for using instrumentals and sounds as not just musical art forms but as storytelling devices is undeniable. Each listener may take away something different; new perspectives, messages, or challenging emotions.
Perverts twists deeper into darkness with “Onanist.” A grungy bass instrumental cuts through the enchanting piano and breathy vocals. Like “Punish,” Cain sings about the torture that happiness has forced her to suffer through. She cannot help but confront and dive head-first into darkness at every turn. “Onanist” is not entirely an acceptance of the darkness that lives within, but an awareness that darkness has the power to consume her.
“Pulldrone,” the longest track on the album with a fifteen-minute runtime, is more spoken poetry set to instrumentals than a traditional song. However, as Cain’s songwriting is strong and poetic in nature already, her words carry meaning and power just like the other tracks do. While her words are spoken softly and are sometimes difficult to understand, an eerie undertone of drone sounds wraps you up in a frenzy of emotions, and you are encouraged to lose yourself and just breathe and experience the moment you are in.
“Etienne” feels more stripped back, with a dark, rich, and lonely piano instrumental that blends with a faint and rustic guitar and what seems like waves crashing in the far distance or strong winds whipping through flat fields. The song feels cinematic, similar to previous tracks, but the addition of guitar instrumentals adds a springing quality that separates the tracks from the rest. There is not enough diversion for the track to feel out of place, but there is just enough experimentation for the sounds to evoke new emotions and perspectives.
Photograph by Silken Weinberg
Ethereal and haunting vocals fade in and out through space, echoing and blending with humming instrumentals in “Thatorchia.” Devoid of lyrics, the vocals and instrumentals build together as a grungy guitar scratches at the surface, threatening to consume the song in despair. To conclude the album, Cain combines surprisingly hopeful lyrics with breezy and more layered instrumentals in “Amber Waves.” The lyrics remain melancholic, but there is a glimmer of hope and a sparkle of light at the end of the long and twisting tunnel: “Before she leaves/Amber waves at me/Days go by, time on without me/I’ll be alright, I'll be alright/I take the long way home/Shaking the bottle and letting them roll/'Cause the devil I know/Is the devil I want.” Beautiful vocals combine with rich and mellow piano instrumentals and drone sounds. “Amber Waves” feels like the natural conclusion to such an experimental project.
Perverts takes you on a journey you cannot imagine until you have experienced it fully. Cain sought to create a project that transcended music and she accomplished just that: “I’d also like to thank the natural drone music that exists everywhere in this world, in transformer boxes and power lines on the side of the highway, in the radio static of an empty AM frequency, in the fan of my computer as my Ableton project files overloaded the CPU, and in the distant roar of the interstate on the other side of my favorite field. I love you, sound, you have always been there for me.”
Make sure to listen to Perverts to experience Ethel Cain’s study of sound for yourself and to read more about Ethel Cain, read the official review of “Punish.”
