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I really don't understand why this band, in particular, attract such passionate feelings of hatred, especially in the UK from what I've experienced personally at 2 major UK festivals: At Download 2006, Dani hilariously taunted fans and belittled their throwing skills, before berating one particular person for bringing an apple to a metal festival. Sadly, the flipside was the deplorable incident at Bloodstock in 2009 where guitarist Paul Allender was injured by a hard projectile (allegedly a large gobstopper sweet) thrown by a mindless cretin who later boasted about it...allegedly, I should add... in the campsite. Although on both occasions, the crowd were booing and throwing items towards the stage, which is not only ridiculous and dangerous, but also disrespectful to both to the artist and to the fans who have paid money to watch them perform. If you hate a band enough to throw something at them, why are you watching them and not getting a drink at the bar? Is it to show your friends how "cool" you are? Let's face it, you are abviously a moron and metal could do without you. You give us all a bad name.
We should be proud and supportive of our home grown talent, regardless of whether or not you like the music personally. I mean, the UK was the birthplace of metal music, but we haven't exactly set the world alight for the past 2 decades. In COF, we have an extreme band who have managed to conquer both the world and even more astoundingly, the mainstream. Let's face it, how many Extreme Metal artists have you seen on Nevermind The Buzzcocks? I know what you are (probably) thinking, and yes let's get this out of the way...Cradle ARE an extreme band. Just because a band are loved by young girls or featured in K! magazine, doesn't mean they are not extreme.
Musically, COF are among the most unique and experimental bands out there, but do people sing their praises? No. If Emperor, to come up with an, admittedly lazy, example had released "Cruelty And The Beast", it would have been hailed, rightly, as a masterpiece. It has classical influences, it has orchestral flourishes, it has an almost soundtrack feel to it. At the time both the press and the fans did rate this album highly, and the follow up, "Midian" was also a huge success. After that, however, it all seemed to go badly wrong.
One reason I can think of for this is that the band commited the most heinous of (extreme) metal sins...They signed a record deal with Sony...Yes, that's right. They signed a deal with a major label. And for this, they were crucifed by the elistist morons who sadly populate our scene. God forbid that a metal band might actually want their records to actually be available for the fans to buy, to go out on a decent sized tour to far flung locations or to actually make a living. Metal isn't "your" music, it isn't "our" music. It's for whoever wants to buy it or to watch.
Cradle Of Filth take influences from many parts of the wide musical spectrum and bring it together in an undeniably unique brew that, of course, isn't to everbody's taste. You will find symphonic, orchestral parts, classical piano, Maiden-esque riffs, old school solos, thrashy guitars, operatic vocals, Black Metal vocals, male and female voice-overs, choral chanting, and more than occasionally, a hint of Jerry Goldsmith's "The Omen" soundtrack. Listening to any given album by the band you will find this range of styles seemlessly blended with poetic gothic lyrics and a dark sexual undertone into a thing of metal beauty. Take the song "Desire In Violent Overture. You will hear massive riffs, the most metal of solos (just listen at the 27 second mark and tell me I'm wrong), classical strings, female voice overs, gothic keyboards and the, always opinion dividing, black metal screech of Mr Davey. Lyrically, the song, as with much of the bands music, is steeped in gothic beauty in the greatest of English traditions.
There is more to the band than this of course, as anybody who has been a long term fan will tell you. On the "Thornography" album, the band had pretty much dropped any and all hints of anything remotely black metal, with Dani even delivering some clean vocals on some songs. This was gothic rock/metal album with some annoyingly catchy songs. The influences here came more from Bauhaus and Sisters Of Mercy than any of the Norwegian black and white God-botherers.
That's the music element out of the way. of course, this should be the most important thing, but of course there is always the touchy subject of "image" to deal with. COF started out (as a young, inexperienced band, I might add) by copying the Scandinavian black metal acts (in look and style)...and this, I think was the gravest (sorry) of mistakes by the band..and it was certainly one they never quite recovered from. After this, we had thew vampyric look of the "Cruelty..." era. After this, they just started wearing spikes, rubber and leather which of course is more than a slight flirtation with the Goth music scene.
I think that, as mentioned above, one of the things thas has clung on and caused the current bad feeling toward the band is their original black metal style. This led to them becoming, in a way, the British face of the burgeoning black metal scene. Of course, as we know people in that particular scene (let's call them elitists) want "their" bands to never sell any records, to never change their style, to record albums in their bedrooms and to, of course, only be known by them and their circle of friends. This is an idiotic attitude that I believe has played a massive role in the band becoming almost metal pariahs in the UK.
The band moved away from Black metal early on, but the tag stuck and despite the band's sounds now being, for the most part, unrecognisable from that of the early albums, they are still incorrectly referred to as Black metal..when realistically they are just a dark, gothic, extreme metal act.
In part, the band (well Dani) can also be blamed for playing a part in this whole situation, due to the shocking "revolving door" policy of the band...members seem to come and go with disturbing regularity. On saying that, for the last decade Dani and Paul have both been a stable part of the band. Also I think the constant courting of controversy with numerous slogan T-shirts, has harmed the band's reputation too, especially among the older fans who look upon it as immature and unnecessary. It has to be said that Dani has quite the reputation for being obnoxious, drunk and arrogant too...although; I can't personally comment on this as I met him twice and he was pleasant enough.I don't know how nuch this "diva" behaviour has contributed to the bands overall standing though...that's certainly one for debate. Was Dani an arrogant person before or was it the attitude of the fans towards him that made him like that as a defensive stand?
I think that there is one more reason why the band have received such harsh criticism from metallers, and that is the, obviously, very feminine and sexual overtones in their music. From the cover art, to the lyrical themes and even to the, occasionally over-powering, operatic voice of Sara, the music explores female sexuality and the historical and current attitudes towards it. I won't dwell too much on this, as I am no expert in sexual behaviour or attitudes. I just wanted to give it a mention as I think that, with metal still being an overwhelmingly male dominated and aggressive genre, this could well be an important factor in the way the audience views the band. The fact is undeniable that COF live shows have a much higher female to male ratio than many other metal shows,,,and for this reason, I think a lot of the Black Metal or Extreme Metal audience is put off. I am not, even for a moment, saying that women don't like or understand Extreme metal. It's just that the audience for this music (which is aggressive and often hateful) is still populated by a huge percentage of males.
Well, there are my thoughts on this...they may have been rambling, they may even have been total bollocks, but they are mine...and I just thought they might be of interest to some people.
