God, they sound so empty and soulless, mere parodies of orchestral emotion. Keyboardist Ashley Ellyllon makes her one and only appearance for the band, although how much she actually plays is anyone’s guess, as we have good old Mark Newby-Robson - who isn't even a member of the band - on ‘orchestrations’, which is code for programmed computer keyboards. So the bedrock of the songwriting – the mighty riff – was lame from the beginning of the race, if you'll excuse the mixed metaphor. Three guitar players with barely a decent riff between them. There’s even a character hidden in the credits called Andy James who mysteriously contributes ‘additional guitars’. James McIlroy is also present on guitars, but it’s hard to know what, if any, impact he had.
With a dry and chunky technique at the best of times, he seems not to have anything to say musically. Guitarist Paul Allender is virtually drained of riff inspiration by this point after a decade with the band. Let’s look at the components that contribute to the whole that is ‘Darkly Darkly Venus Aversa’.Ĭradle have always had revolving line-ups, even in their glory days, but here we have a few issues. Alas, ‘Darkly’ is the sound of a band that doesn’t really want to be there but still feels that it should give things a shot.
History has also shown that a renewed line-up would later produce exciting and emotive albums again, like ‘Hammer of the Witches’ and ‘Cryptoriana’, bringing new life to the band. While not everyone enjoys the more commercially focused albums like ‘Thornography’ and the surprisingly effective ‘Nymphetamine’, those albums at least had a spark of creative energy about them. Released in 2010, ‘Darkly Darkly Venus Aversa’ (a ridiculous title which is already becoming annoying to type out) presents the band at their most weary and uninspired. Then at the other end of the scale we have the much less engaging ‘Damnation and a Day’, ‘The Manticore and other Horrors’ and the hapless ‘Darkly Darkly Venus Aversa’. ‘Vempire’, ‘Dusk and Her Embrace’ and ‘Cruelty and the Beast’ – even ‘Midian’ – are grand monuments of adventurous darkness, clever lyrical wordplay and emotive gothic anthems. In the mid to late 90s, Cradle of Filth produced some of the greatest metal albums ever to emanate with darkened grandeur from Britain’s haunted shores.
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