From the moment when ‘Interrogation’ begins, you can tell that Body Count are bringing in the alarming nightmares that are about to unfold in front of the viewer’s eyes in all of its horror film style. There’s no denying that Ice-T isn’t backing down without a fight.
Yes, he’s known as a rapper, yes, he’s known from his film and TV work such as New Jack City, Ricochet, Johnny Mnemonic, the cult classic Tank Girl starring Lori Petty in the main role, and of course his main role as Sgt. Odafin “Fin” Tutuola in Law & Order’s: Special Victims Unit and Organized Crime. But he’s more than what you see on TV and on the big screen.
For Body Count, who launched back in the city of Angels in 1990, they’ve been given the opportunity to go into deeper, darker, territories, filled with controversy, and pure anger at its finest with their latest album Merciless. Listening to this album, you can tell that Ice-T refuses to apologize. If you think he’s going to do a sob speech in front of Oprah, that ain’t gonna happen. Why? Because Ice-T doesn’t do that shit. He’s being true to this word and being brutally honest on what’s happening in the world then and now.
The album is very much like a horror movie in disguise when you listen to this bad boy, top to bottom. And to be allowed to have Corpsegrinder (Cannibal Corpse), Joe Bad (Fit for an Autopsy), Max Cavalera (Sepultura), and Howard Jones (no, not the ‘80s new wave icon, a different Howard Jones known for his work such as Killswitch, Blood Has Been Shed, and Light the Torch) on the album, they knew they had to bring in the big, massive guns to raise hell like a motherfucker.
With ‘Fuck What You Heard’, the band get down to business. With Ernie C and Vincent Price leading in with the alarming nightmare as the government between the left and the right have turned into a free-for-all civil war as the band’s response to The Purge begins. Ice-T raps the line, “They control our lives, they live off lies / They look ya in the face, don’t even wear a disguise / Cross the gang, muthafucka, you die!”
Ice himself is adding enough fuel to the fire to bring in the theme matters to life as you can imagine families locked up in their homes as the craziness that’s going outside, they’re watching it on TV, betting on who will make it to the top at the end. There are moments where it almost reminded me of the 2013 video game, BioShock Infinite where in the floating city of Columbia at the beginning of the 20th century, the battle between the Founders and Vox Populi becomes an all-out war to see who will take control and who will go down.
But it’s their take of Pink Floyd’s ‘Comfortably Numb’ with help from David Gilmour playing additional guitar, that hits home. I wasn’t sure on how Body Count was going to do this, but the way they did this, they nailed it down. Yes, they’ll be a divided line in the sand over their take whether Floyd fans will accept it or not, the lyrics Ice-T raps about is how fucked up the world has become since the pandemic started five years ago. The riots, social media, the protest, the tension, its almost as if the nightmare is about to unfold in front of your television screen.
The opener ‘Interrogation’ is quite an alarming introduction as if Orwell’s view had come true with Big Brother watching over you with its own take of the Ludovico treatment. You can tell that Body Count had watched not just Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange, but Alan J. Pakula’s 1974 political thriller, The Parallax View starring Warren Beatty that comes to mind.
Once it segues to ‘Merciless’ we prepare for the civil war that’s about to unfold as all hell has broken loose upon the streets where the lockdown has made people go criminally insane and go on this rampage. The powder-kegging riffs, the riots, pumped-up bass’, Body Count go in for the kill when it comes to the Thrash Metal motif that’ll make you headbang like there’s no tomorrow.
You can tell their tipping their hat once more to the Bay Area scene of the ‘80s where bands like Metallica, Slayer, Testament, and Exodus were getting started as it comes to the hellish brawl-for-all, the ‘Purge’ which features Corpsegrinder’s growling vocals chanting “PURGE!” as if the fights were just getting started as Ill Will goes into some crazy-ass drumming with bloodcurling screams and chainsaw-like effects in the background for the ‘Psychopath’ to reign terror thanks to Joe Bad’s help.
If you think this is The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or the Friday the 13th franchise, think again. This is the horror movie that we’ve been waiting to see that isn’t your typical franchise, but full-on gore, full on graphic violence that audiences have been waiting to see in its true glory, top to bottom.
‘Live Forever’ is Howard Jones pouring his heart and soul with his gut-wrenching vocals and going in this primal scream effect as if Ice-T is letting him know to let it all out and give him all of the ammunition he gives to him by going out in a blaze of glory, not some punk being gunned down before Sepulatra’s Max Cavalera comes out of the ocean like a blood-thirsty beast, ready to reign terror by eating a shit-load of human flesh like there’s no tomorrow on the ‘Drug Lords’ that have taken over!
There’s elements of Venom’s Black Metal that comes to mind, Angel Witch, a darker version of VOIVOD, Body Count know their source material very well by putting metal on its feet. This album needs to be played at a maximum level to send a wake-up call on what’s happening then and now. They are their own form of music when it comes to metal. Merciless isn’t just a fantastic album, it is as brutal, harder, skull-crunching, gangsta rap, political, and the dystopian nightmare that’s unfolding in front of our very eyes.
