Cradle Of Filth – Damnation And A Day (2003)

March 12, 2021

What is considered by many to be a missed step by Cradle is actually one of my favourite releases for them. Depending on how old school the Cradle fan you are talking to is, Cradle either died with Midian, Damnation… or Nymphetamine. I can see arguements for all of the above, when comparing and contrasting to the original style and vision of the band, but all of the above are great albums in their own right (yes, even Nymphetamine. Fight me.).

Damnation And A Day is gorgeously ambitious. Its not as intricatly woven and spookily, authenticatally gothic as say, Dusk… And Her Embrace, but Damnation has its eyes on the bigger picture, the long game as it were. I don’t think its possible for a band of this style, with this budget, and with a “one CD” time limit, to make anything even more epic than this. Boasting full ochestration and Sony’s big budget studio production, Damnation sounds a thousand times better than both previous albums combined.

The album is split into several “parts” containing three songs a piece. These are separated by intermissions of orchestrated pomp and narration provided by some very evil sounding Welsh man. Honestly, there isn’t a bad song on this record. Sure, some of them do not necessarily need to be as long as they are, but the strongest “parts” are the opening three tracks and the closing three. The closing three are a hat-trick of some of the greatest Cradle material of all, and even if you hate this album, I implore you to try these tracks again.

This is also the album that gave us “Babylon A.D.” and “Serpent Tongue” so let’s not be too quick to shit on it, no matter how terrible the album art is!