But not enough to save you
Hayden Silas Anhedönia (born March 24, 1998), known professionally as Ethel Cain, is an American Singer-Songwriter from Tallahassee, Florida.
Raised in Perry, Florida, she was raised in a Southern Baptist family and homeschooled for her entire life. She was introduced to music through her family's church, becoming involved in the church's choir and studying classical piano; she eventually left the church when she was 16.
She started writing and recording her own music in the mid-2010s, and officially started the Ethel Cain project in 2019. In 2022, after several successful EP releases, she released her debut album Preacher's Daughter, which received critical acclaim and garnered her a cult following.
Genre-wise, her music is considered a mix of Dream Pop, Singer-Songwriter, Ambient, Alternative Rock, and Slowcore. Thematically, her music deals with topics including intergenerational trauma, Domestic Abuse, drug addiction, poverty, death, and religious trauma. Her music is also notable for its use of "Ethel Cain" as a character separate from Hayden Anhedönia, especially on Preacher's Daughter, a Concept Album for which Ethel serves as the protagonist.
Discography
- Carpet Bed (EP) (2019)
- Golden Age (EP) (2019)
- Unreleased I (Compilation, 2020)
- Unreleased II (Compliation, 2020)
- Inbred (EP) (2021)
- Preacher's Daughter (2022)
And I still call home, those tropes in Nebraska:
- Album Intro Track: "Family Tree (Intro)" for Preacher's Daughter.
- All Girls Want Bad Boys: A theme in many of Ethel's songs is of being in love/obsessed with boys of nefarious character that includes differing levels of Domestic Abuse. Preacher's Daughter in particular has Logan, Isaiah, and (to a much lesser extent) Willoughby.
- Awesome Mc Cool Name: Hayden Silas Anhedönia. And it's not even the Stage Name she goes by.
- Alter-Ego Acting: Ethel Cain is a character. You'll often see fans refer to the real-life Hayden by her real name to differentiate her from the persona.
- As the Good Book Says...: "Arsony" starts with a recitation of the first few lines of the Book of Genesis.
- Careful with That Axe: Most notably on "Ptolemaea."Stop... stop... stop... STOP!
- Celebrity Song: "Michelle Pfeiffer."
- Concept Album: Preacher's Daughter is one about the character of Ethel Cain running away from her home in Alabama and ultimately being murdered and cannibalized.
- Country Mouse: Proudly considers herself a redneck, and is currently living in the big city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
- Echoing Acoustics: Her music uses a lot of reverb.
- Epic Rocking: Her default mode of songwriting.
- Face on a Milk Carton: Mentioned in "Strangers."When my mother sees me on the side of a milk carton
In Winn-Dixie's dairy aisle, she'll cry and light up for me - The Gunslinger: In real life, not in character. Being a proud Southerner, she owns quite a few.
- I Have Many Names: Went under multiple aliases before deciding on Ethel Cain, such as Atlas, White Silas, Tommy, and Miss Anhedonia.
- Instrumental: "Televangelism" has no singing, just an eerie piano.
- Location Song: "A House in Nebraska," which is, of course, about Nebraska.
- One-Woman Wail: "August Underground" consists of Ethel vocalizing over an intense, haunting track. Fitting, given it's the track corresponding to Ethel being murdered by Isaiah.
- Parental Incest: "Hard Times" reveals that Ethel was a victim of this by her own father.
- Protest Song:
- "American Teenager" is an anti-war song.
- "From The River," a song she uploaded to SoundCloud in support of Palestinian liberation.
- Road Trip Plot: "Thoroughfare", though it isn't as romantic as the song initially makes it seem.
- Spoken Word in Music: The outro of "Ptolemaea," spoken in a pitched down Creepy Monotone.
- Stripperific: Wears a pair of stripper platform heels on the "Gibson Girl" single cover.
- Trans Tribulations: Subtextually. Part of why her music delves into themes of religious trauma and a love-hate relationship with Deep South culture is due to her experience being ostracized by her community when she came out as transgender.
- Unreliable Narrator: Invoked with "Thoroughfare." The song revolves around Ethel describing how she met, traveled the west with, and fell in love with Isaiah, while related source material reveals that Isaiah had forcefully kidnapped her from the start and kept her drugged during their travels. "Gibson Girl" follows this up with Ethel embracing the role of the seductress, when in reality, Isaiah is pimping her out and it's a coping mechanism for the scenario that she's trapped in.
- A Wild Rapper Appears!: Lil Aaron and Wicca Phase Springs Eternal appear on the Inbred EP.
