Like the best B-movie craftsmen, Wednesday 13 continues his career in a strange balance: at once an essential cult figure for fans of horrific mischief and, yet, still strangely under the radar. Around ten years ago, the former Murderdolls frontman was gradually moving towards a heavier, more metal sound, which was evident on the Condolences album. Mid Death Crisis won't be the swan in a glorious family of ugly ducklings: it's just as weird and deformed as its big brothers, following a tradition that's as delightful as it is deeply rooted.
Mid Death Crisis: you can recognise him in this name, with its puns and punchlines that could be heard coming from the mouth of an adult Wednesday Addams (please, not the Netflix one) or the Keeper from Tales from the Crypt. Moreover, Wednesday 13 doesn't hesitate to recycle its tricks and its best turns of phrase: When the Devil Commands, for example, takes a few words from What the Night Brings and The Devil Made Do It from the old Frankenstein Drag Queens From Planet 13 days, and follows in a line of immediately catchy anthems. More than a rehash, we prefer to think of it as the antics of a ringmaster re-enacting the best tricks of his monstrous circus, well aware that he's evolving in a world all his own. After all, in the 60s, The Addams Family also reused certain gags from one episode to the next!
As for the music, let's say it straight out: Mid Death Crisis contains no surprises. We're sticking with the same punk/metal/glam mix, full of references, inherited from Alice Cooper, Mötley Crüe, The Misfits and Rob Zombie. Like its predecessors, while it doesn't forget the good words and that gory party mood that's as wicked as it is ultimately harmless, the album turns out to be crueler, darker. It's as if the gentle gothic films starring Vincent Price had been replaced by slashers or torture-porn (we're more Friday the 13th than Wednesday, you know). The result is riffs that slash, martial rhythms that shrivel: Decease and Desist, When the Devil Commands and My Funeral are as vicious as they are exhilarating. Wednesday 13 is a primal pleasure, the pleasure of dancing with a bunch of zombies, chopping off limbs with an axe and wading through guts.
A potpourri of his misdeeds, we're of course treated to both the lighter, punkier tracks (Rotting Away, Blood Storm) and, more interestingly, the more melancholy shades that remind us how Wednesday 13 also know how to touch our guts without ripping them out thanks to their vocals (In Misery, I Hurt You). However, the latter are not as common as in the past. In the end, Mid Death Crisis delivers everything we love about the band, from big, hard-hitting hits to more bittersweet passages, all wrapped up in a consistently effective package. There's also everything that doesn't work so well: in a completely subjective way, we'd point the finger at the more punk tracks, which have trouble imposing a sinister atmosphere.
In his Mid Death Crisis, he also reminds us that he is slowly approaching the fifties (remember: ‘In 1976-6-6, I was born a bastard and a son of a bitch’). So it's easy to see why the nostalgia that has always been with him seems more present here, with a few glam/heavy kitsch guitar forays that are more assertive than usual (and the appearance of Taime Down from Faster Pussycat on No Apologies). We also accept that his irresistibly fun teenage bravado (and probably unbearable for serious, clean, bald people) has mutated into this heavier monster, and that his rabid wolf voice is denser too. But it's hard to dismiss him as a throwback to the past, since Wednesday 13 seems to be evolving in a personal, timeless universe of delightful latex monsters, amusing mutilations, deviant black masses and G.I. Joe nailed to crucifixes.
Mid Death Crisis refines the formula. Does it contain the best tracks of his career? No. But none of them are really weak, the whole thing is a pleasure to listen to, more fun than the previous Horrifier and Wednesday 13 remains an artist in a class of his own, genuinely engaging in his sincere passion and his gallery of horrors. We love to see gim as this weird guy in the grimy clown make-up who invites you to visit his attractions at the turn of a deserted road: some will ignore him, others will shun him, but we know that you, the twisted ones like us, will be happy to go back and have a good laugh with all the respect and tenderness we owe him... ay your own risk!
