Review: Armand Hammer & the Alchemist, ‘Mercy’

Armand Hammer’s second collaborative effort with producer the Alchemist, Mercy falls in need of the dizzying, Dada-esque thought experiment that was 2021’s Haram. Whereas rappers Billy Woods and Elucid stay incisive and mercilessly exacting verbal forces, the Alchemist appears to be coasting a bit too closely on intuition this time round. The album sounds good however not often attains the abrasive sonic character or formidable style fusion of 2023’s We Purchase Diabetic Take a look at Strips, which drew on the abilities of 15 totally different producers, together with a gaggle of reside jazz musicians, to form its cacophonously cerebral sound.

The music on Mercy leans towards the menacing and oppressive, thick with simmering rigidity. “Grabba” creaks together with sweltering bow strokes, whereas “Peshawar” erupts with digital noise, like a supercomputer that’s moments from meltdown. However nevertheless environment friendly, the Alchemist’s sonic palette—murky loops, lo-fi samples, and so forth—is restricted. There’s a way that he’s content material to search out the proper temper and simply linger there, which in flip packing containers Woods and Elucid in, as on “Tremendous Nintendo,” which is constructed solely from a looping 16-bit–fashion synth motif.

Nonetheless, the duo stays a fascinating research in distinction. A weary nihilist, Woods raps with a bemused resignation, whereas Elucid, the theatrical orator, is all bombastic doomsday warnings. They complement one another by by no means fairly syncing, producing a rigidity in tone and cadence that retains their verses alive. But once they commerce bars on “Tremendous Nintendo,” the trade feels clumsy, made worse by the disruptive pauses between their verses. They function finest when orbiting each other, letting their ideas move free with no superfluous interruptions.

Woods, as ever, instructions the most consideration. On “Nil by Mouth,” his line about “crocodiles weeping whereas they eat your salty tears,” which he delivers with a stinging matter-of-factness, appears like a distillation of his worldview. And through the again half of “Dogeared,” he hyperlinks a bunch of benign actions—taking the bus, feeding his youngsters, strolling the block, turning the warmth on as the seasons shift—with mesmerizingly mundane precision earlier than casually indulging in self-mythology, saying he appears like “Spider-Man on that ledge” together with his masks off “like Future.”

Mercy is the type of album that elicits respect greater than it does pleasure. Woods and Elucid stay elite craftsmen, and the album features properly as a reminder of their talents, but it surely’s a minor entry in a decade-long discography that has stretched rap into singularly unclassifiable territory.