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The only thing CoF really lack, which Iron Maiden did have, is those incredible rousing choruses.

However, musically CoF have a lot more up their sleeves, making use of orchestral strings, chugging riffs, organs and synth sounds, female vocals, a fair few voice-overs, plenty of palm-muting and lashings and lashings of double-kickdrum. ‘Forgive me Father I have Sinned’, is Maiden-meets-Metallica with female vocals reminiscent of Evanescence.įurther comparisons with Iron Maiden are inevitable – Maiden are the only British metal band to outsell Cradle of Filth, and Dani Filth himself has said this album takes after them. ‘Deceiving Eyes’ starts off with an amazing Pantera-esque riff, but doesn’t develop it the way I would hope – it reverts to the musical equivalent of a pneumatic drill once the drums kick in. ‘The Persecution Song’ stands out – slower than most of the rest, but building throughout the song to a real head-banging conclusion, with just enough space in it to make it really good to mosh along to. If I’m honest, I’m not sure that I want to hear about, “The spurting of his seed inside her cave”, on my lunch-break, but if I had this album as a fan, I would most certainly want to be able to make out what was being said/shouted/screamed. The squeeze to get every last drop of volume out of the music often leaves the vocals a bit swamped and indiscernible.

Unfortunately, the machine-gun drumming has been compressed into monotony, and it’s hard to feel a real sense of ‘rock’ in the tunes, despite the pretty incredible musicianship. Overall, Darkly… has a very intense sound – mostly double-kick driven, fast and angry. For example, the voice-overs that say, “All mirrors lead to my palace – my exotic pleasure temple”, and, “I’ll nurture you and hurt you too, fulfil all wishes for my sad Aladdin”, both seem a bit silly really – but this may be because I am not listening to it in the appropriate midnight, candle-lit, blacker-than-black surroundings there’s no wi-fi coverage in my dungeon, don’t you know…

The lyrics and subject matter are pretty standard metal fayre, but I find myself unable to get in to them. Cradle of Filth’s 9 th studio offering is a concept album, based around the demoness Lilith, first wife of Adam and subject of various stories and boobs-out painting over the years.