MERC is not here to fuck around. If YOU would like to fuck around, MERC will make damn sure you find out. This North Carolina quartet (originally a duo) has a knack for creating cacophonous, carefully crafted casualty-inducing canticles of the modern age. Since their first release in 2024, they have been on a quasi-Full of Hell tear by consistently releasing new music in a short time span. MERC’s growth is most apparent on their newest release, Dehumanized. Mind you, the same ferocity is quite evident on this record as was displayed on their debut self-titled release, however, there is a sharpening of MERC’s powerviolence iron with an increasing confidence to experiment; and why wouldn’t they since adding a second bassist and all.
MERC is violence incarnate. Whether it’s through the punishing sub-minute songs to their imagery and iconography. Hell, they were selling custom printed MERC machine gun magazines at their shows (I don’t know pews pews so I assume machine gun ¯\_(ツ)_/¯). One look at the lyrics for Dehumanized, not only will you find messages of disdain, anti-unity, 1-8-7 on an undercover cop, and more, MERC has outlined instructions of the making of a homemade boom-boom (not sure if this will get taken down by saying the “b” word). Also, the band has, on previous releases, instructed on how to create a pipe boom-boom, and a custom 12 gauge shotgun. Some would call this irresponsible but I bask in the glory of a band willing to seek out a concept and run through that concept with ferocity in every aspect. MERC is unabashedly unashamed of their stance in the world and it flows effortlessly in what they do.
“I’m the best at what I do and what I do isn’t nice”, Wolverine and/or MERC. Album opener, “Vertigo”, is a trudging dirge lulling you into a false sense of safety as you ponder whether or not that bubbling ahead indicates a waterfall and then “Plastique” ensures you’re going over and your only net below is the jagged rock formations to inherit your corpse. Then the nihilism begins as MERC pleads to “Bomb this world”. If powerviolence needed a new face, then this band is the visage we fucking deserve. The twin bass assault has never made a guitarist more superfluous and unnecessary as the bottoming out tone they achieve rattles the bones. “Pigs in a line/Slaughterhouse 5-0” MERC screams in “Pigs in a Line” indicating their own disdain for authority and describing the inefficacy of putting your life in the hands of other mortals who can’t be trusted. Album favorite, “Joke of the Year”, is a bullet train of venom and phlegm dissecting wannabe tough guys but exposing them for the paper gangsters that they are. Oh, and clown horns. You’ll see.
Our first foray into the realm of experimentation arrives next in the title track, “Dehumanized”. An instrumental that feels more at home on a Drain record than it does here. Not being a true instrumentalist myself, I am in awe at the atmosphere MERC creates with two basses on this song, adding such depth and nuance in another lulling, breath-gathering moment. While this isn’t the first time the band has played around with styles, see: “Swallowing Cigarettes” off of Names and Addresses EP, they aren’t afraid to push further. “Ineffable” serves as the third instrumental with this song providing more sludge and mud coupled with a clip of the ineffably deranged Colonel Walter E. Kurtz’s monologue from “Apocalypse Now”; a mascot for MERC if there ever was one (respectfully, of course).
I’m pretty fucking sure this album could cause spontaneous combustion if played at the correct decibels. Dehumanized is anger incarnate and MERC is the conduit through which the god of spit and vitriol channel its despair. This is the definition of powerviolence and an example that that descriptor need not be a concrete barrier from creativity. MERC has been pumping out material like a machine possessed and I, for one, am ready and willing to accept the onslaught with each passing release. Get some or get fucked.
- Fav song: “Joke of the Year”
FFO: grindcore. going fast, powerviolence, hardcore, incendiary devices, drum n bass, fucking shit up, metal
Follow this fucking link to listen and while you’re there, fucking buy something from the band:
Windmills, Spinkicks, Headbangs, Push Pits 
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