Review Summary: Stay the fuck away from this album, it is plagued with flaws such as terrible lyrics, appalling vocal work and boring guitars that do nothing but chug along.
Dani Filth sure is a strange person. This is the man who once said he would take a job as a postman if he were not an immensely famous black metal vocalist. This is the man who has possessed some of the oddest hairstyles in the music industry. This is also the man whose band has just released their latest installment in their discography to reviews bordering on the positive end of the spectrum. However, Cradle Of Filth have one album that has completely divided their fan base, supposedly the turning point from their days of black metal into a more commercially-oriented territory. The album is of course Midian.
This was the album that spawned the mega-hit music video on MTV Headbangers Ball, for the song Her Ghost In The Fog, which may well be one of the worst songs in the bands discography, and is joint worst song on the album with Lord Abortion. Her Ghost In The Fog is plagued with some of the most appalling use of operatic vocals I have ever heard, with some truly terrible female vocals in the background. Also, this song is one of the best to display the crippling point of this band, which also happens to be the most famous aspect of it: the vocals from Dani Filth. I do not claim to understand what is wrong with his voice, but Dani truly is the worst vocalist in black metal. The first time you hear him, you may well think that he can hit some shockingly high notes and that this will be an album to enjoy. However, within minutes the tones he uses will begin to grate on you, until your sanity is slowly being eroded away by the tragedy that is unfolding. Also worth pointing out is the silly sections of the album in which he spews his poetry in a gravelly old man style of vocals, which sounds just as ridiculous as his usual vocals. Also on this album he attempts some death growls, which are not quite as bad as the rest of his performance, but are still not close to the forerunners in the vocal style, feeling too forced. The moments that take the cake as the worst vocal moments on the album, however, are the moments in which he attempts a deep growl and a high scream at the same time, leading to the worst possible cacophony of sounds imaginable.
The use of keyboards is one slightly redeeming feature on this album, not feeling quite as out of place as certain artists, such as the gothic metal bands or even fellow black metallers Dimmu Borgir. They are utilized to quite astonishing affects at times, particularly on the song Tearing The Veil From Grace, which stands out as being the only fully realized and decent song on the album. The keyboards give this album a true feeling of emotion, which is missing from every other aspect of the album, leading to some decent enough passages.
The worst, however, is yet to come. The lyrics. Dani Filth may well be a poet who studied English Literature at university and now holds a degree in said study, but that does not mean that his ramblings have any place in the world of black metal. Gone are the days where shocking imagery was essential for Black Metal, as various bands have proven since, and yet Dani insists upon screeching his lungs out about rape and the occult. Sure, they may be well written lyrics, but they remain some of the most ridiculous in the genre, being overly complex and deep, and without feeling as though they are required for the music on display here.
The instrumental work here is far from above average, with the guitars being the chugging one would expect from an industrial metal band, not a band in the black metal genre. Where is the tremolo picking? Where are the blast beats? Missing from this album, by the sounds of it, replaced by an over-reliance on organs, keyboards and various other unconventional instruments for the genre. This album lacks any real feel of heaviness, which is the thing that, in the end, kills off any credibility this album has.
This is a less than passable album that fails to have any real saving graces, instead being over drawn out with ridiculous lyrics and ear piercing shrieks that do nothing but show off how high a note a screamer can realistically hit and prove exactly why a band should not take the route that Cradle Of Filth have taken over the years.
