I own and enjoy Cruelty and the Beast. It flows well from track to track, and although the lyrics try too hard to be poetry, I find the lyrical content to be the main appeal of this album. Elisabeth Bathory is an interesting figure worthy of serving as the basis for a metal concept album, although of course the band takes some rather large liberties with historical records in retelling the story. That being said, nothing I have heard from CoF compels me to seek out more of their material, so I suspect I'll just continue to own the one album I do.