By Sara Poric ’26
Sometime in Oct. of last year, I was scrolling through TikTok and came across a video with a gorgeous song playing in the background. I instantly became obsessed with it and added it to my playlist. Soon after, I listened to the artist’s album, “Preacher’s Daughter,” and fell in love.
“Preacher’s Daughter,” by Southern artist Hayden Silas Anhedönia, also known by her stage name, Ethel Cain, is Anhedönia’s hit concept album (released in 2022) inspired by parts of her life. The album consists of 13 tracks, totaling 73 minutes, and it follows the 20-year-old fictional character Ethel Cain through her horrific life, grappling with her trauma and past. To be clear, Anhedönia’s stage name is different than the character. The character is what the album is about, not the actual artist. The story takes place in 1991, 10 years after Cain’s father, Joseph Cain (the preacher), dies. “Preacher’s Daughter” is categorized as a mixture of dream pop, alternative, dark ambient and slowcore. Anhedönia wrote and produced all 13 songs, playing bass, piano, guitar, and harmonica, along with some help from musicians Matthew Tomasi and Steven Mark Colyer on a couple of the tracks. “Preacher’s Daughter” is one of three albums Anhedönia plans to create, “Preacher’s Wife” and “Mother of a Preacher” being the sequels. The album consists of sensitive topics, such as religious themes, sexual abuse, physical abuse, incest, drug use, prostitution, death and cannibalism. I recommend listening to the album first before you continue reading; there will be spoilers.
The album begins with “Family Tree (Intro),” a 3-minute and 41-second song. It gives the listeners an insight into Cain’s life, previewing her relationship with her family. No matter how hard you try, your parents will always be a part of you, whether you like it or not. The song uses heavy drums and guitar to create a beautiful blend that builds in intensity until the end.
The next song, “American Teenager,” is probably Anhedönia’s most pop-sounding song in the album, with the instruments playing an upbeat and energetic tempo. It is 4 minutes and 18 seconds long. Cain grew up in an incredibly religious Southern town in Alabama. The song exposes the negative side of the “American Dream,” criticizing its harsh requirements to achieve a better, stable future. Additionally, it goes further into Cain’s past, revealing her apprehension towards her faith. She feels alone, even with her intensive religious upbringing. One of her more popular songs in her discography, “American Teenager” was also in the former President of the United States Barack Obama’s Spotify Wrapped in 2022.
“A House in Nebraska” is one of my favorite songs from Anhedönia. It is 7 minutes and 46 seconds long. It begins with a slow, haunting piano, and her powerful voice immediately brings your attention to the lyrics. Anhedönia creates this beautiful imagery of Cain and her ex-lover, Willoughby Tucker. Cain reminisces about the good times she and Tucker shared before he left town prior to the start of the album. The song is full of longing and regret, and it is heartbreakingly perfect. The house Cain talks about in this song is not actually in Nebraska, but in Alabama (where Cain grew up). Cain and Tucker spent a lot of time in the abandoned house, imagining it was their own, somewhere far away from Shady Grove, Alabama, their hometown.
Cain meets a flawed, violent criminal named Logan Phelps in “Western Nights.” Despite his many problems, Cain finds herself infatuated with him, even enduring his relentless abuse at times. Phelps only uses Cain for her body, and Cain delusionally believes he loves her, so she chooses to stay with him regardless of how he treats her. Fortunately, Phelps dies while in a gunfight with the police during a bank heist, forcing Cain to flee from the cops and her home. It is 6 minutes and 5 seconds.
“Family Tree” is the next song in the album, and it reveals more about Cain’s family and the past trauma she experienced. She desperately wishes to be baptized, to be clean from her sins and burdens. She wants to start her life over, so she runs away from the police, her hometown, her family and her life altogether. It is 7 minutes and 10 seconds.
“Hard Times” is probably the most devastating and soul-crushing song on the album, coming in at 5 minutes and 3 seconds long. It marks the end of Act 1 of “Preacher’s Daughter.” The song explores Cain’s and her father’s complex relationship when she was younger, right before he died. Cain suffered sexual abuse from her father, and she contemplates the conflicted emotions she has towards her father in the song. Despite going through that at such a young age, she still has love for her father and idolizes him. This is most likely why she is attracted to men who treat her horribly when she is an adult, such as Phelps.
“Thoroughfare” is the longest song on the album with a time of 9 minutes and 27 seconds. It is the start of Act 2, meaning the story will take a more dark and sinister turn. Still on the run from the police, Cain meets charming Isaiah Abram, who offers her a ride from Texas to California. Cain was last seen in Arlington, Texas before she went missing. During the trip. they begin a relationship. We learn later on, however, that Abram is a vile person, and that this interaction between him and Cain isn’t real. In reality, Abram kidnaps Cain, and she develops Stockholm Syndrome, falling in love with her kidnapper.
The name of the eighth track, “Gibson Girl,” is inspired by the illustration “The Gibson Girl” by Charles Dana Gibson. It portrays the ideal image of a feminine body, and it’s the perfect title for this song. It is 5 minutes and 42 seconds. After Cain and Abram make it to California, Abram gives Cain drugs and prostitutes her out to different men. The song consists of heavy reverb, replicating Cain’s drugged state of mind. She loses her sense of reality, believing she is doing a good thing.
“Ptolemea” is another one of my favorite songs on the album with a time of 6 minutes and 23 seconds. I highly recommend listening to this song in the dark, at night, alone and with headphones on to get the full experience. The production feels like being in a horror movie, and I absolutely love it. The name comes from Ptolemy, a circle of Hell where traitors reside in “Dante’s Inferno.” The demonic voice in the beginning and end is Abram speaking to Cain. Drugged and delusional, Cain hallucinates her parents while in Abram’s attic, showcasing her lost grip on reality. In this state, she tries fighting Abram off, growing more desperate. She repeats the word “stop” over and over, with the last one being an agonizing and distressing scream that gives me chills every time I hear it. Afterward, Cain is alone, slowly bleeding out on the attic floor, left to die.
Cain dies in “August Underground,” murdered by Abram. The song is an instumental, and its name comes from a famous snuff film of the same name. It is 3 minutes and 40 seconds. Another instrumental, “Televangelism” is 3 minutes and 3 seconds long. Cain moves on into the afterlife, and she reminisces about her past there. These two are my least favorites, mostly because I am not a huge fan of instrumentals.
In “Sun Bleached Flies,” Cain makes peace with her death, reflecting on her life, her family, and Tucker, the only man who truly loved her. It is 7 minutes and 36 seconds. While in the afterlife, she found herself wanting to go to church. Even though she disdained it and what it represented when she was alive, she loved the comfort and community it provided. After everything, Cain makes peace with her life in death. She forgives.
The last song of the album, “Strangers,” is 5 minutes and 44 seconds. Cain watches what happens to her body in the afterlife. Abram puts Cain’s body in a freezer in his basement. Cain finds herself admiring and caring for Abram, even after death, portraying her twisted sense of love. After putting Cain’s body in the freezer, Abram devours her. She thinks about her mother, imagining her seeing Cain on the side of a milk carton in Winn-Dixie. During the early 1990s, advertisements for missing children were often put on milk cartons. In the outro, Cain patiently waits for her mother to join her, watching over her and loving her from afar.
“Preacher’s Daughter” is an insane emotional rollercoaster, and it is truly amazing. It is definitely not for everyone, but the attention to detail and love Anhedönia puts into her work is astonishing. It is one of those albums that gets better after each listen because you pick up on things you never noticed before. One thing about Anhedönia is that her songs, even though they are pretty long, don’t feel like they are dragging on. If anything, I wish they were longer. Anhedönia is an incredible songwriter, producer and artist, and her story-telling is on a whole new level.
The Raider Press 