Methyl Ethel’s Powerful “Matters” Certainly Haunts

by Nathan Russell

March 11th, 2022

When the Australian alt-rock outfit Methyl Ethel first arrived in my headphones at the recommendation of “Trip the Mains” by a work colleague, I was struck at the unorthodox mix of cleanliness and dustiness. Sticky analogue bass and synths, a crunchy yet saturated drum section, a blaring and fleeting guitar lick, with a nasal yet soothing upfront vocalist joined by a haunting chorus of harmonies overdubbed in sections; it had been some time since I’d been this off-put by an introduction to a musical act.

On the 4th full-length album from the Perth natives, the haunting continues. “Are You Haunted?” contains a claustrophobic edge from start to finish. Lead singer Jake Webb’s shaky vocals on ’Something to Worry About’ accurately present the uncertainty of the lyrical content. Though popular cut ‘Neon Cheap’ consists of much of the danceable bounce seen on fellow Aussie Kevin Parker’s last Tame Impala record “The Slow Rush”, the eery hums surrounding Webb’s main takes force the listener to question whether they feel the song is worth moving to (I swear, I mean that in the best way possible).

However, charm meets bone-chilling most ripely in the last leg of “Are You Haunted” with the record ‘Matters’. The song takes off immediately at warp speed, with each musical element bouncing off the auditory walls. The content of the song suggests many of the overtures of songs like ‘Something to Worry About’, but with a far more urgent claim to there being “something wrong again” at the door. The song feels (and reads) as an attempt to return to one’s physical frame from out of body experience, a practice that may require you to “suture the street-split boulevard”; a state in which you may find yourself “busy in erosion”. The record hits overdrive at the chorus; Webb’s bleating over being “nervous at the thought of something wrong” speaks to the paranoid approach much of this album sinks into.

When this LP hits its highest notes, it is as catchy as it is creepy; ‘Matters’ is where that emotional climax is reached.