Joseph Poole, an American vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, and lifelong horror aficionado, records and performs as Wednesday 13. Although he first gained wide attention as the lead singer of the Hollywood horror-punk and heavy-metal outfit Murderdolls, Poole’s résumé also encompasses stints with Maniac Spider Trash, Frankenstein Drag Queens from Planet 13, Bourbon Crow, and Gunfire 76. Under the Wednesday 13 banner he has issued several albums, among them the 2011 release Calling All Corpses, 2015’s Monsters of the Universe: Come Out and Plague, 2019’s Necrophaze, and 2022’s Horrifier.
Born in North Carolina, Poole launched his musical journey in 1992 with Mizery, the band that subsequently became Psycho Opera. Between 1992 and 1996 he fronted Maniac Spider Trash; after departing that group he co-founded Frankenstein Drag Queens from Planet 13 alongside former bandmates Abby Normal and Sicko Zero. The trio issued five studio albums and six EPs across five years before disbanding in 2003, when Poole’s commitments to Murderdolls intensified.
Adopting the Wednesday 13 name in 2004, he debuted with the EP 6 Years, 6 Feet Under the Influence. The following year brought the full-length Transylvania 90210: Songs of Death, Dying, and the Dead. In May 2006 a comprehensive box set, Little Box of Horrors, appeared, succeeded that September by Fang Bang. The darker, heavier Skeletons arrived in 2008, and Calling All Corpses followed in 2011. The project’s fifth studio album, The Dixie Dead, surfaced in 2013, trailed by Monsters of the Universe: Come Out and Plague in 2015 and Condolences in 2017—the first Wednesday 13 record issued through Nuclear Blast.
Poole enlisted DevilDriver guitarist Michael Spreitzer to produce and engineer the sessions for the eighth album, Necrophaze. The 2019 LP also introduced guest appearances, featuring Alice Cooper, Stone Sour’s Roy Mayorga, and Lacuna Coil’s Cristina Scabbia. It became the band’s highest-charting effort, reaching number 2 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart. Horrifier, released in 2022, delivered a high-energy collection of groove-oriented horror rock drawing inspiration from classic 1980s slasher films such as Halloween and Christine.
