THEN CAME ETHEL CAIN

ETHEL CAIN閃亮登場

An interview with everyone's favorite new musician, plus a new episode of V WANNA KNOW.

一場與人見人愛的新興音樂家的采訪，附贈V WANNA KNOW的最新一集。

June 22, 2022

2022/6/22

TEXT: MATHIAS ROSENZWEIG

編輯:馬西亞斯·羅森維格

“I didn’t really have a lot of friends for a while,” Ethel Cain says into her camera. She’s in a cabin with her family in Tennessee.? “I didn’t really get out of the house much. I was my whole world.”?

“實際上很長一段時間里我沒有什么朋友，”Ethel Cain面對鏡頭如此說道。她正與家人住在田西納州的一間小屋里。“我并不經(jīng)常外出。自我即世界?！?/p>

That world, previously occupied only by 24-year-old Hayden Anhed?nia (Ethel’s legal name), has since piqued the interest of thousands thanks to the release of her debut album, Preacher’s Daughter. That world is full of hair curlers, army camo, Victorian nightgowns, hauntingly beautiful vocals, and imagery of American youth in the south, smoking cigarettes in fields they drove to in pickup trucks. Cain might be a character of sorts, she is not too distant from Hayden, the source.?

她口中那個先前由24歲的Hayden Anhed?nia（Ethel的真名）一人占據(jù)的世界，隨著其首專[牧師的女兒]的發(fā)行激起眾多人的興趣。那是一個滿是卷發(fā)棒、迷彩軍裝、維多利亞式睡裙、余音裊裊的聲線，以及美國南方青年在皮卡貨車之旅的終點于田地間抽煙的圖景。該隱或許是某種角色，但與Hayden關(guān)系甚密。

“Back in 2018, I was 18 years old,” she starts, reminiscing on the path that led her here—”here” being a place where Anhed?nia is working as a career musician and grasping the attention of fashion magazines and designers alike, parting the waters of the Alt-Pop ocean like a gothic Moses making space for herself. “I was super inspired by horror video games, especially Resident Evil Biohazard…I was unemployed and would just sit in my room, smoking weed every day, playing these games. I was going to make a horror album called Black Genesis...it was basically a concept album about, like, what if God and his angels were evil?”

“2018年時，我18歲，”她開口道，追憶引領(lǐng)她至今的道路——如今的她作為職業(yè)樂者，吸引著相似的時尚雜志與設(shè)計師的關(guān)注，如同哥特摩西1般分流非傳統(tǒng)流行樂界的汪洋2為自己開辟出一席之地?！拔液艽蟪潭壬鲜芸植烙螒騿l(fā)，尤其是生化危機...失業(yè)那段時間，我每天就坐在房間里吸?大?麻，玩這些游戲。我想制作一張恐怖專輯名為黑色開端...大概是一張有關(guān)假如上帝和他的天使們是邪惡的概念專輯。”

This interest in God was, in a way, forced upon Anhed?nia as a child. Raised in the Southern Baptist Church in Perry, Florida, she had little contact with the secular world. Musically, she immersed herself in Christian music like Gregorian Chants.?

這種對上帝的興趣，某種程度上，在Anhed?nia年幼時便已強加于她。在弗洛里達，佩里的南部浸信會教堂長大，她與現(xiàn)實世界聯(lián)系甚少。她將自己沉浸于基督教音樂比如格林高利圣歌。

She went on to scrap the Black Genesis album after writing a song called "Stranger" about a serial killer kidnapping someone, paired with the development of Stockholm Syndrome. This was one chapter of a multi year-long story in which she repeatedly wrote and scrapped entire projects, salvaging only the strongest tracks, which have since found their way into her debut album.

在寫下“Stranger”一歌后，她打消了創(chuàng)作“黑色開端”這張專輯的想法?！癝tranger”講述了某人被連環(huán)殺手綁架后陷入了斯德哥爾摩情結(jié)。這是長達數(shù)年的創(chuàng)作故事中的一章，期間她反復(fù)編寫解構(gòu)整部作品，打撈最精華的樂曲，從而成就了首專。

All the while, Anhed?nia’s private world, one she shared with Ethel Cain, was changing. “I moved into a car lot, living in this little house at the back. This family turned their property into a car lot and rented out the house. I was living in this little side room. I just remember sitting there on the carpet, just writing this album and recording all these little demos.” Despite the world she was imagining, and the merging of this place with the real world we all share, it wasn’t always the easiest to translate into music.?

與此同時，Anhed?nia那個曾經(jīng)只同Ethel Cain分享的隱秘世界，逐步蛻變?！拔野徇M了一個停車場，生活在車場后面的一間小屋里。有一家人變賣財物買下了停車場并出租這間屋子。我住在其中一間小小的偏房里。坐在地毯上，寫下專輯，錄著一段又一段的樣帶，這些回憶依然生動。”盡管她有幻想中的世界，且這方沃土正與我們共享的現(xiàn)實世界相融合，將此般種種譯作音樂的形式從來不是容易的。

“It’s like having a crazy acid experience and you see all sorts of shapes and colors, and then trying to explain that to other people the best you can. I’m just like, ‘God, I hope I’m doing it justice.’”

“就像是擁有著瘋狂尖酸的經(jīng)歷，你能看到各種形狀與色塊，然后盡己所能嘗試把這些解釋給其他人聽。我be like'上帝啊，愿我做得還不賴'。”

Now that she’s having some success, which surely comes with more financial stability and (hopefully) confidence in her craft (not that the latter ever seemed to be lacking), I ask what she thinks of the tough days living in a car park.?

鑒于目前該隱的小獲成功，經(jīng)濟支撐和（但愿有）對于其作品的信心（后者似乎仍然欠缺）勢必接踵而至，我詢問她如何看待住在停車場的艱苦日子。

“I don’t want to think of those as like, the dark years. I don’t want to think of those as years just spent grinding and working. I spent all my free time working on music, yes, but I also ran around the woods with friends, spending my rent money and going without dinner so that I could buy an old lady dress because it made me feel pretty…I feel like, I’m either gonna make it one day or I’m not gonna make it. But either way, I want to look back and know that the journey was not completely painful.”?

“我并不想把那些時光看作黑暗歲月。也不想把它們看作徒費時間打磨與工作的日子。的確，我用自己的全部閑暇創(chuàng)造音樂，但與此同時我也和朋友們繞著森林奔跑，揮霍我的租金以及晚餐節(jié)食省下的錢來買一條舊式女裙，只因它讓我感到自己是美麗的...我覺得，自己要不然好好度過這一天，要不然一日也無法茍活。但無論怎樣，我希望能在回首時看到這趟旅程不只有苦難。”

She goes on to describe more of that time, stories of running around with lots of friends and no money, saving up coins for Subway hoagies and getting drunk in abandoned parking lots. She says that she was depressed, but that she doesn’t really remember the bad parts.?

她繼續(xù)描摹著那段時光，講述著與群友四處奔跑、身無分文，為了吃上地鐵三明治攢硬幣，還有在廢棄的停車場喝得酩酊大醉。她說她有過沮喪，但不為那些不好的記憶耿耿于懷。

Anhed?nia pauses for a moment.?

Anhed?nia突然片刻停頓。

“It was, actually, just the purest form of me that I think has ever existed.”

“實際上，我想，只有最圣潔的那部分我曾真真切切存活于世?！?/p>

CREDITS: PHOTOGRAPHY BY SILKEN WEINBERG

攝影by西爾肯·溫伯格

摩西1:圣經(jīng)中的希伯來先知、猶太人的領(lǐng)袖

分流非傳統(tǒng)流行樂界的汪洋2:原文為“parting the waters of the Alt-Pop ocean”，此處類比了《圣經(jīng)》創(chuàng)世紀(jì)第一章中上帝的創(chuàng)世行為——

“And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.”

（神說：“諸水之間要有空氣，將水分為上下。”）

（神就造出空氣，將空氣以下的水、空氣以上的水分開了。事就這樣成了。）

翻譯 by胡紙

hope u like it?