Cradle Of Filth – Dusk… and Her Embrace

In a way, you could say Dusk and Her Embrace represents the absolute pinnacle of what symphonic black metal was capable of producing, and it’s certainly the highlight of Cradle of Filth’s nearly 25 year career. One might be tempted to say that the aforementioned In the Nightside Eclipse represents the climax of the genre, but I personally view that more as just a straight black metal album with both keyboards and a heightened sense of majesty and grandeur compared to many of its contemporaries. Dusk and Her Embrace takes that majesty, bathes it in a brine comprised of Hammer horror flicks and Sheridan Le Fanu novels, and unleashes onto the world a perfect storm of savage black metal and hauntingly melodic atmosphere the likes of which I’ve yet to find a rival for in all of extreme metal. Sordid as their history may be, fickle as many of their detractors past and present have been, and lame as a few of their later outings would prove to be, Dusk and Her Embrace is the absolute greatest achievement of the symphonic black metal style. Should I ever find myself with the ever-hypothetical choice of what to bring with me to a remote island located in the middle of an ocean halfway around the world, all I would need is an iPod with this album on perpetual loop. That is plenty good enough for me, now and forever.