Interview with Dani Filth by Carina Lawrence

British extreme metal veterans Cradle Of Filth continue to terrorise and delight on their fourteenth opus, ‘Screaming Of The Valkyries, ‘ which will be unleashed on the 21st of March via Napalm Records. It delivers some of their most ambitious and devilish offerings yet. I got to speak to the band’s masterful creator and vocalist, Dani Filth, who joined me on a Zoom call while he was at his home in Suffolk, UK, to discuss the new album and much more.

Getting straight into the new album and the obvious question out of the way. How did you arrive at the cool album title of ‘The Screaming of the Valkyries’?

The title is from a line in the last song (on the new album), ‘When Misery Was A Stranger’, and it was inspired by the fact that I found out that we are barely seconds away from midnight on the doomsday clock due to accelerated warfare throughout the world of late. I just got struck by this image for the analogy of a cataclysmic event, which would be hearing this screaming on high and realising that the last line of the defence of the heavens had fallen, thus Ragnarök or the end of the world, but then likening that to the imminent realisation, like if you were to stand on a beach and a hundred-foot tidal wave was in front of you or you were walking down the street and an atom bomb goes off or a hydrogen bomb, it would be that final sort of moment of clarity, where there really is the end and its prevalent in that title…that, and it is just a good heavy metal title!

What are the main themes of the new album? It seems to be a pretty diverse mix in terms of song titles and lyrics, as you have some Latin with the song,’ Non Omnis Moriar’, (which translates as ‘Not all will die’) and ‘White Hellebore’ (which is a poisonous flower).

Yeah, there are lots of things going on, but it’s really up to other people to decipher what they think, so I can’t really go into everything. I prefer that other people make their minds up when they get the album. When I was a kid, when I got an album, whether it had a lyric sheet or not, more often than not, if it was an import which I used to order from Shades in London and between that, the album cover and the music, I would create my own stories, some are more evident than others.

Can you tell us about the single ‘To Live Deliciously’ and what it is about? Like me, it seems like everyone loves this song!

Yeah, it’s the opening of the album. It does what it says on the tin. It’s a positive message to say, to indulge in everything you enjoy doing, within a reasonable amount of respect for others, but from my perspective, doing what I do is a lifestyle, so I’m fully immersed in it. I love everything about it, from videos to…it extends past that into the life I live. With the album ending on, well, it’s not really a bitter ending because the lyricism is past tense, so it offers a degree of hope, but the album does begin with a bit more of a celebration of things, which this album is really.

How do you keep the inspiration flowing? Especially as this is your fourteenth album? What are some of the main influences/inspirations for the new album? Horror has always been prominent for you as a band.

Loads of different things. It’s hard keeping anything original nowadays; it’s all been done and regurgitated, and the gaps are all filled in musically, as there are so many different kinds of bands. When it comes to horror, every band is an expert on it, whether they are like a rap band or a reggae band. Inspiration…I can only speak for this album as it’s the newest one, but it comes from everything. Events in the world, personal events, nature, what is going on at theatre and cinema at the time, literature- it’s endless, really, and inspiration can strike in the weirdest of moments. We went to Florence recently, and this artist there was speaking and saying that he disappeared and would go somewhere and spend a few weeks away and honing his craft away from people. It’s like, yeah, that is a great idea but also an expensive one, again, if you’re drawing a blank. You can be in the most inspirational places in the world, and it just might not click, and like I say, inspiration can come in the most ridiculous moments. It could be shopping in Sainsbury’s (Supermarket) and be like ‘Hey, I’ve got it’. It’s happened to me often, where I have literally just downed tools and said like, ‘I have to go home; I have forgotten my notebook’.

The new album excels as a summation of the band’s past sound while taking bold new steps, acting as the perfect evolution. What in particular about this album made you decide to try and take things further? Was it in part due to the new line-up? (Donny Burbage – guitars and Zoe Marie Federoff – keyboards/vocals, both of whom joined in 2022).

Of course, fresh blood always helps. I think it’s just an evolutionary step for us. We have been doing a lot of touring lately; ever since the pandemic, we have been making it up to our fans by touring the globe a lot. In America alone, in the last three years, we had a big Danzig support tour, two co-headlines with Devildriver and are about to go back and do a co-headline tour with Dying Fetus for the “Chaos & Carnage” tour run, and that’s not the rest of the world either. We have been around it a lot. That’s why the album took a little longer. It’s not because we were out of ideas or anything like that. It was that the recording took a year because we had things planned that had to be worked around, so we did the drums, and then we went out with Wednesday 13, then did something else, so it was backward and forward, which is unlike us really but that’s just because post-pandemic, again we were just trying to work in making up for lost ground. Actually, saying that, we were in America during the pandemic; we went right at the very end and had to endure all kinds of weird and wonderful COVID protocols. So, I think this album was birthed out of the fact that we were spending a lot of time playing a lot of material. I mean, it’s easy to forget that if you have fourteen albums that don’t even include EPs and bonus tracks, and you have a repertoire of three or four hundred songs. I was washing the car the other day and had my headphones on and had it set to random, and a track from one of our albums came on, and for like the first two minutes, I didn’t even know who it was! God’s honest truth (laughs). Then it twigged, and I was like, oh my god, yeah, that was a special edition track from ‘Thornography’ (2006). So, I think playing a lot of live material has been inspirational and helped. New people with whatever entry-level albums that they became Cradle Of Filth fans thrown into the mix, and it’s just a very good vibe in the band at the moment, so Zoe Marie Federoff (Keyboards/vocals) has just married Marek “Ashok” Šmerda (guitars). We all went to the wedding in Arizona at the beginning of the year, and we have just solidified a really good crew. Things are going very well as a family, and subsequently, I think that would filter through to the music as well.

How does it feel to look back on your career? Did you ever foresee how far Cradle Of Filth would come, like signing with big labels like Napalm Records and touring the world?

Well, obviously not, but originally, when you come up with the idea of ‘the band’, you are still playing bass on a tennis racket in your bedroom. I admit, first and foremost, I was playing at my school, and then I was playing in a big arena in my head, so I probably thought about it, but at that young age, I probably didn’t even think you could reach the age of forty-five or fifty…so no, the answer is no.

This year marks the 25th anniversary of your fourth album, ‘Midian’ – how does it feel looking back at that record and that time in your career?

That was a very magical time of our career because that followed the second catastrophic event that beset the band. Well, I mean when I say catastrophic, it evidently wasn’t but it could have been. As it was the departure of Nicholas Barker (drummer), Stuart Anstis (guitar) and Les (Smith – keyboards), all be it at different times. Barker left and was replaced by Andrian Eriandsson, but literally barely a few months into him joining the band, maybe four or five months, I sacked Stuart and then Les because he fought the sun shined out of Stuart’s backside at that time; he evidently doesn’t now. He decided to part company as well. So, the band was just rebuilt, and that was the second time that it had happened with three members. So, we had Paul Allender (guitars) back and Martin Powell on keyboards and Adrian on drums, but the other three of us had a glorious time, and we recorded ‘Midian’ at Parkgate Studios, which is our first dalliance with that place as we did three albums there. Amazing. We loved every minute of it; it was like being on holiday. It was a magical time of my life, I think, and we used J.K Potter as I was a big fan of his and he was the artist. We were doing our movie at the time, Cradle Of Fear (2001), so we knew him from that and also Doug Bradley, who obviously plays Pinhead (actor in Hellraiser horror films) and also Dirk Lylesberg in Nightbreed, which is about Midian or Cabal (Clive Barker novel) which also about Midian as well. It was just a wonderful time. My daughter was also born shortly before we entered the studio.

What is something you like or can tell us that is very unexpected and may surprise people?

We have non-metal nights on the bus, like 80s nights and stuff like that, just because when you’re on tour for six weeks, it gets a bit much, and it’s just fun to do things like that. I think everybody knows everything there is to know about us.

Following on from that, about unexpected things. I have to ask about the collaboration with Ed Sheeran. How did that come about, and what was the experience like?

I can’t really talk about that at the moment. We are in a negative blast radius from our album that we don’t want to interfere with. Also, having spoken to Ed’s management recently, he is about to make some moves as well, which requires us to do a bit of radio silence until it’s ready to be released. It was amazing, but unfortunately, it’s just not on the record.

Keeping with collaborations – if you could collaborate with anyone else, who would it be?

In terms of metal folks, I would like to do another song with King Diamond. Rob Halford (Judas Priest) would be good. Alana Del Ray would be an exceptionally different person to go with in terms of what we have done before. Not just in terms of Ed, but with Bring Me The Horizon and Motionless In White, it’s just someone very different that I think would work really well. I mean, people thought the Ed thing wouldn’t work, but it really does, and I think Alana Del Ray would be an exceptional choice. Wishful thinking!

What are your tour plans for this year, especially in the UK?

We have got three or four shows: Norwich, Margate, Southampton and Torquay. They are interim shows between the festivals, and we have Nervosa as support. They are amazing. Aside from Norwich, it’s High Parasite, who toured with us on British dates last year, and they were amazing. Really love that band. Which is Aaron (Stainthorpe) from My Dying Bride’s new outfit. We are leaving off England apart from those dates and Download Festival this year as after that, we are off to South America for a while, and then it’s a sort of dot dot dot because things are slowly coming in for the end of the year and we are hoping to be in for the next record at the end of this year.

Do you have any memorable moments from playing Download Festival UK in the past?

Absolutely, from going there as a kid when it was Monsters Of Rock and playing there. I remember taking my daughter there and her hanging out with The Prodigy, that was cool. She was only about five at the time, and her hair was all done in plaits, and it looked really cool, and everyone was taking photos of her rather than me, and she came out on stage and then went “Metal!” and also there was the time before, when the moment we started playing, there was like a deluge that just soaked everything and everyone. It was literally a clear day, but it just happened the moment we started. I almost got dragged to the stake for witchcraft for that one. It’s a quintessential British festival; we would be lost without it. Well, that’s not fair because Bloodstock is amazing, and we have some other ones (festivals) that are creeping up, but there is something about playing Download; it’s still a great festival.

What else do you have planned for the rest of the year, or would you like to achieve musically and personally?

Lots of shows, working on a new record, just being prolific as we are hitting our stride. Lots of personal things. The new video for ‘White Hellebore’ comes out (is out now), and the album comes out March 21st. We are doing another video for ‘Demagoguery’, I just invite people to look at our website and social media pages to keep abreast because things happen all the time. We have got a collaboration with the Fashion House Vetements happening, that’s like a capsule, and we have got a collaboration with BlackCraft Cult in America, so yeah, lots of things happening, and they happen all the time. My partner can’t keep abreast with it; she’s like, I thought you said you put this in the calendar, and I’m like, I haven’t put it in my calendar yet as I only just found out, so yeah, many things. All very positive. We also have an HMV signing on March 22nd 2025 (HMV Oxford Street, London), so that will be good, and of course, the album release, I am very much looking forward to that!

New Album, The Screaming Of The Valkyries, out March 21, 2025 via Napalm Records – Pre-Order NOW

The Screaming Of The Valkyriestrack listing:
1. To Live Deliciously
2. Demagoguery
3. The Trinity Of Shadows
4. Non Omnis Moriar
5. White Hellebore
6. You Are My Nautilus
7. Malignant Perfection
8. Ex Sanguine Draculae
9. When Misery Was A Stranger

CRADLE OF FILTH is:                    
Dani Filth – Vocals
Marek ‘Ashok’ Smerda – Guitars
Martin ‘Marthus’ Skaroupka – Drums
Daniel Firth – Bass
Donny Burbage – Guitars
Zoe Federoff – Vocals, Keys

CRADLE OF FILTH online:
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NAPALM RECORDS