CRADLE OF FILTH's DANI FILTH: How Pandemic Affected Making Of 'Existence Is Futile' Album

Vocalist Dani "Filth" Davey of veteran British extreme metallers CRADLE OF FILTH recently spoke to HeavyMetal.dk about how the pandemic affected the making of the band's new album, "Existence Is Futile". He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "The album was written before the pandemic. The drums, fortunately, were recorded before any lockdown which was, obviously, brilliant because our drummer [Martin 'Marthus' Škaroupka] is from the Czech Republic, so he wouldn't have been able to get over to record. And in fact, [guitarist] Ashok [Marek Šmerda], who's also from the Czech Republic, didn't arrive in the studio until five months after Martin. But with the drums down and the fact that we demoed everything very extensively, I was able to carry on laying vocals down regardless of whether guitars were down or not. So, in that respect it affected us because we had to do things in strange orders, like drums, vocals [chuckles] and bass and everything else later on when, obviously, the lockdown was lifted and when people were able to travel."

He continued: "[The pandemic] didn't affect the lyricism, it didn't affect the ideology of the album because that was already cast in stone. But — maybe I'm wrong in saying this — I actually enjoyed the pandemic at that point because it afforded us a lot of time… well, not a lot of time, but more time than we usually would have. Me and the producer were literally working half days. Normally in a studio, you literally work 14, 16 hours a day. We were working, like, six hours a day. There was no rush. Everything was very relaxed, and it gave us the opportunity to be very critical. There was one song, 'The Dying Of The Embers', which literally [wasn't going to] make the album… We had another song which we'll leave for later — maybe another record, maybe not at all — that was going to be in its place, but we kind of worked on it and juggled things around and re-wrote the chorus, and it turned from a song I really didn't like to one of the best songs on the album. So that was one thing that the pandemic gave us."

"Existence Is Futile" was released in October. The LP was pieced together in isolation at Grindstone Studios in Suffolk with studio guru Scott Atkins (DEVILMENT, BENEDICTION, VADER). Horror icon Doug "Pinhead" Bradley made a welcome return to the CRADLE fold, lending his dulcet tones to the band's most politically astute song to date, the epic "Suffer Our Dominion" as well as the album bonus track "Sisters Of The Mist", which is the conclusion to the "Her Ghost In The Fog" trilogy that started over 20 years ago on the infamous and classic "Midian".

Eight months ago, CRADLE OF FILTH announced the addition of keyboardist Anabelle Iratni to the band's ranks.

Iratni, who previously played alongside Filth in DEVILMENT, as well as her own group VEILE, made her live debut with CRADLE OF FILTH on May 12, 2021 during the band's livestreamed concert.

Anabelle joined CRADLE OF FILTH as the replacement for Lindsay Schoolcraft, who announced her departure from the group in February 2020 after a seven-year run.

CRADLE OF FILTH is:

Dani Filth - Vocals
Richard Shaw - Guitar
Marek "Ashok" Šmerda - Guitar
Daniel Firth - Bass
Martin "Marthus" Skaroupka - Drums
Anabelle Iratni - Keyboards & backing vocals