Cradle of Filth’s Dani Filth shares his “side of the story” as members quit over “unprofessional behaviour”

Cradle Of Filth‘s Dani Filth has shared his “side of the story” after the departure of multiple band members.

Last weekend, spouses and bandmembers Zoë Marie Federoff and Marek “Ashok” Šmerda quit Cradle Of Filth, citing “low pay”, “stress” and “unprofessional behaviour”, including management withholding proper compensation and Filth’s “foolish” decision to collaborate with Ed Sheeran.

Federoff later shared a further statement on the situation on Facebook, which alleged that the couple “make [£]150/day currently and [£]25K a year roughly in this band, to clarify the math”.

Federoff went on say: “We planned this transition out of Cradle of Filth months ago. Management is dishonest, manipulative, and tries to take money that belongs to us with no contract between us session musicians and him.”

She also made an allegation that unnamed “management” had attempted to “steal” album advance money from their 2025 record, ‘The Screaming Of The Valkyries’, and that she had been threatened with dismissal.

Now, Filth has issued a statement on the situation in an eight-slide Instagram post, which included screenshots of a text exchange between Ashok and the band’s manager Dez Fafara.

In the statement, Filth says the contracts his band members signed were supposed to be rough drafts and starting points and that he never expected anyone to actually sign them.

He says the contracts were signed in a rush so that the tour could get off the ground, which was a “mistake”, and that he will work to make sure the language is better in the future.

“Of course Zoe would show you the worst and it saddens me that the context of what I thought was our dialogue was warped to fit an agenda and made public,” he wrote.

“Zoe and Ashok had already tendered their resignations despite me agreeing to a pay-rise amid additional financial protection, so I was in absolutely no hurry to waste money with our lawyer drafting up a contract that was already destined to be pulled apart anyway.”

Filth says the South American tour that led to Federoff and Ashok’s departure involved drunken fights between the couple, including an alleged incident in front of fans who’d gathered for a meet-and-greet. Filth alleges that this was “a pattern of abusive behavior that strained the entire team”.

“In Zoe‘s defence, I do account her outburst on the fact that we had barely eleven hours sleep in four days, but again I don’t think this is a worthy excuse,” he continued. “No one else behaved in this manner. We were too tired to for a start!”

The post ends with screenshots of Ashok calling Fafara a “sick evil person trained by sickest person in music industry – Sharon Osbourne – the criminal who should be whipped to death.” In response, Fafara says he has been supportive during Ashok and Federoff’s past crises and that he and Filth have been trying to find money to pay them.

Federoff has since reacted to the statement on Facebook, writing: “It’s an untrue statement from multiple angles and our lawyer’s response is coming. That’s all for now.”

Kelsey Peters will be taking over on backing vocals and keyboard duties for the remainder of the tour. In his statement, Filth told fans that “Ashok’s temporary replacement is [being] flown out to join the tour in a few days”.

He promised that the group “WILL NOT cancel any of our South American shows”, but asked his followers to “bear with us” as they continue “with only one guitarist live” in the meantime.

Filth revealed that Cradle Of Filth’s team-up with Sheeran was “done and dusted” at the start of this year, but later confirmed that it would not appear on ‘The Screaming Of The Valkyries’.

Earlier this summer, Dani Filth proposed to his long-term girlfriend Sofiya Belousova during Cradle Of Filth’s performance at Download Festival.