Ethel Cain – ‘Willoughby Tucker, I’ll Always Love You’ album review: A visionary talent
Ethel Cain is a visionary.
With the release of Preacher’s Daughter in 2022, the claim of creative prophet was more than proven as Hayden Silas Anhedönia opened up a story that would go far beyond the songs on the album. It contained characters to care about, a narrative to follow, details to remember, and a world of references unlike anything else.
Years later, with a far larger audience waiting, Willoughby Tucker, I’ll Always Love You provides a prequel to the tale, and even stronger proof of the artist’s crystalline vision.
Willoughby Tucker, I’ll Always Love You is more than just a sophomore album, although many people may view it that way. For those more casual listeners who don’t want to dive any deeper, Anhedönia allows that with powerful singles like ‘Fuck Me Eyes’, her take on ‘Bette Davis Eyes’ and a jealousy-tinged anthem of admiration, or ‘Nettles’, an eight-minute long emotional opus that is so textured and gripping that it seems to pass in a second, weaving between big topics of love, loss, abuse, and gender roles with unrivalled poetic ease.
Like Preacher’s Daughter, this second album features instrumental tracks that show off another side of Anhedönia’s talent, which she previously spotlighted on Perverts. But like the debut, these moments don’t feel like filler and the songs that sit around them are powerful enough to do it all; to be enjoyed as standalone pieces, to be listened to on shuffle or from start to finish, to be plucked from the lot as singles or sung along to at live shows, or, in the most interesting approach, to be honoured as chapters in a grander story.
Preacher’s Daughter dove into Ethel Cain’s story from an early heartbreak, escaping her abusive family, and eventually landing in an even more dangerous situation. At the end of that debut, Cain dies, but here, she’s granted more of a voice as Anhedönia goes back in time to the character’s life before the opening notes of ‘Family Tree’ ring out, providing more depth before she finally puts the figure to rest.
Set in 1986, five years before the events of Preacher’s Daughter, we have the most blistering of heartache albums. “Willoughby Tucker is more of my insecurities and frustrations and fears and inadequacies in love,” Anhedönia said of the record. It’s felt across each and every track and thought in each instrumental detail, from the huge thrashing drums that come in during ‘Dustbowl’, leaving the listener with those feelings echoing like a pounding heartbeat in the chest as it all gets darker, to the cinematic and tensely goosebump inducing ‘Radiotowers’ that moves the story along with a hospital beep, signaling her lover’s injury before moving into ‘Tempest’, a ten-minute-long swirling epic with a visceral heart.
For fans, Willoughby Tucker, I’ll Always Love You provides absolutely everything and more, sitting as a release that will no doubt reveal more and more with each repeat. ‘A Knock At The Door’ sounds exactly like her old Soundcloud demos, as her step up in fame and opportunity since those tracks and her debut were recorded simply by the artist herself has had no impact on the raw sound that is clearly just as essential to her vision, sticking to still making things simply with almost everything done by her hands.
The final and official release of ‘Dustbowl’ and ‘Waco, Texas’ gives full life to two of her finest songs to date, and with each turn of this tale, the world of Ethel Cain only expands alongside the visionary power and ever-growing potential of Hayden Silas Anhedönia as her creator.
Poignant and powerful from start to finish, it can be no less than full marks for a work this thorough and this impactful.
A standout track – ‘Dustbowl’: The crescendo may just be the finest piece of music so far this year. The way Anhedönia has crafted that song, sailing you through the highs and lows of the emotional journey in time to her instrumental, letting her voice flit from angelic highs to rough, dark depths, it’s nothing short of a masterpiece even before those drums kick in and punch goosebumps up from your skin.
For fans of: Truly sinking your teeth into an album, analysing the lyrics, finding new details listen after listen, and following it through, start to finish.
A concluding comment for the Ethel Cain fandom: Can’t wait to see your wall-sized map of clues and theories all plotted together with pins and string.
Release date: August 8th, 2025 | Producer: Hayden Silas Anhedönia and Matthew Tomasi | Label: Daughters Of Cain Records
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