Ward XVI – Id3ntity

Released by: Earache Records

Release Date: 11.07.25

Running Time: 56:24

Review by Dark Juan

Score: 927,158,234,291,799.4/10

It is fair to say that I am something of a unique individual. When I am not writing terrifying shit that offers an uncomfortable insight into the blood-soaked confines of my own psyche, I am busy projecting that on to the works of others. A cinematic imagination that is corrupted by many years of watching the most obscene gore, splatter and extreme pornography is rather likely to not conform to any societal norms, is it? I am frankly astonished that Mrs Dark Juan or anyone else put up with me, to be brutally honest. And some silly fuckers have put me in charge of children’s homes, for fuck’s sake. All I’ll say is that it was a good thing they didn’t do any social media checks when I first joined where I work.

For example – today I went shopping in Morrison’s and while waiting at the checkout I had a sudden fantasy about dismembering the rather sturdy lady operating the checkout. I had only nipped in for some fucking lentils. How do you jump from lentils to dismemberment? What could possibly be the mental link between green fucking lentils and wanting to chainsaw the arms and legs off some poor innocent lass in Elland Morrison’s?

The answer, my friends, is Ward XVI. This British bunch of shock rockers have been making rather spectacular waves in the UK Metal scene with their combination of awesome tunes, being really rather friendly and pleasant people and having a live show involving more power tools, gore and torture than a Korean revenge flick. All of which makes for an album, in “Id3ntity” that is so far up Dark Juan’s street it’s happily unpacking in Dark Juan’s spare bedroom for a protracted stay.

“Id3ntity” is the third part of a triptych of terror from the Prestonian mentalists – previous records “The Art of Manipulation” and “Metamorphosis” detailing the growth, subsequent abuse of, murdering by, and incarceration of vocalist Psychoberrie in a psychiatric institution. “Id3ntity” is the story of her release, and subsequent claret-splattered insanity. Let us just say that the story of Pyschoberrie, despite the schlock around it, is surprisingly affecting. If you don’t kind of identify with Psychoberrie, there’s something not right with you in my opinion.

Music-wise, this album has absolutely everything including the kitchen sink, the cruet and most of a mortician’s toolkit thrown in there. There’s kick-arse Trad Metal, Pirate Metal, Funk Metal a la Extreme, Techno, Industrial, Electronic Body Music, horns, keys and… well, you just need to hear it. You could only understand it if you heard it personally. All I’ll say is that Dark Juan totally appreciates this all or nothing approach where there is no such thing as a half-measure or anything even slightly resembling compromise. Ward XVI’s music is a unique thing of their own twisted design, and it absolutely brings out Dark Juan’s own repressed scaphist tendencies. I just need to find my own Mithridates and honey…

Any volunteers?

No?

Well, I can’t say that I am totally shocked.

“Id3ntity” has absolutely fucking everything that Dark Juan holds dear about Metal. It is not just Metal, per se, as influences from other genres ebb, flow, warp and waft around riffs of such colossal majesty that Dark Juan, a man of quite homicidal tendencies and with a REAL problem with authority, is forced to kneel and beg for absolution beneath their crushing power. It is the same with the production on this album. It is a living, breathing, utterly murderous thing that takes Phil Spector’s wall of sound, kicks it in the bollocks, stamps on its face in fuck off hobnailed boots and cranks everything up even further, yet somehow the sound remains coherent, rich and full rather than descending into a disturbing morass of feedback, distortion and screaming. Although it does balance right on the razor edge where power turns into noise…

It is that sense of ragged balance and the teetering on the very edge of sanity that makes this album so fucking great. ‘I Spit on Your Grave’ being especially demented as Pyschoberrie prowls around and threatens and describes exactly what she’s going to do to the victim she has in her grasp in some detail. The music is enhanced on this song by screeching, discordant electronics that unsettle and degrade the senses while the lyrics describe the slitting of the victim’s throat, with, it must be said, considerable relish from Psychoberrie.

Dark Juan is deeply in love with Pyschoberrie. Let’s go murdering together. I have some thoughts about the use of potato peelers and bacon slicers that you might find interesting. Let’s go and find some evil cunt and pin him to the ground with pitchforks and then do a Northern version of the death of a thousand cuts with sharpened spades and bits of broken glass and blunt tin lids… I want to peel the skin from his face like I am peeling a grape…

However, the vocals and lyrics are only a small part of the music of Ward XVI – the melding of Marilyn Manson shocks, Trad Metal power and the stabbing, unpleasantly PRESENT electronics are the perfect foil for the stories of horror that Psychoberrie relates to the poor, unsuspecting listener. The lyrics are writhing, sinuous, blood spattered and deeply unsettling and there’s a whole, savage bent to the album that is a delight to the ears and the already fractured and fragile psyche of Dark Juan. The guitar work of Doktor Von Stottenstein is also fucking superb, whether he is removing faces with majestic riffs or shredding fingers with razorwire solos.  The rhythm section operates with machine-like, jackhammer precision and bludgeon into submission where the rest of the band are sharp and stabby, like Fairbarns-Sykes fighting knives being slipped between the ribs of some poor, unsuspecting bastard. It’s gloriously overblown, unrelenting, chunky, gore-obsessed Horror Metal with all the theatricality of the likes of Sleep Token and Ghost, without actually sounding like them. There’s costumes and characters and cheerful silliness and madness and buckets of blood and a sheer cohesive insanity shared across the whole band that makes Ward XVI compulsively listenable and renders them utterly impossible to ignore.

This is my album of the year. No fucking question. It is PERFECT. Nothing will be able to top this, which creates an interesting problem for Ward XVI. If you have already attained perfection, where do you go from here? You have a compelling narrative already, with the story of Psychoberrie. Where do you go next? It is the same problem that Owdwyr have. It is going to be extremely difficult to top this magnum opus. The Patented Dark Juan Blood Splat Rating System is going to award Ward XVI 927,158,234,291,799.4/10 for an incredibly spectacular and fun album which I am going to have playing when I go to my grave.

PS: You know my long-held theory that every band, no matter where they are from, has either got, or has had, a Dave in it? Ward XVI does…

TRACKLISTING:

1. Regeneration

2. Into The Wilderness

3. What’s In The Box?

4. Macabaret

5. Interlude

6. Blood Is The New Black

7. At The Window

8. I Spit On Your Grave

9. Interlude 2

10. Darkest Desire

11. Amoeba Of Madness

12. Interlude 3

13. We Are Legion

LINE-UP:

Psychoberrie - vocals, programming, keyboards/ synth

Doktor Von Stottenstein - guitars, vocals

Wolfy Huntsman - bass, vocals

Bam Bam Bedlam – drums

Rico Rameres – vocals/ theatrics

Nurse Betty - theatrics

---

 For more, visit the following links: Instagram | Bandcamp | Facebook  | Spotify