Birmingham’s heavy metal beginnings are well documented—as recently proven by the recent passing of Ozzy Osbourne—but did you know that the Second City is also where another, much heavier and more brutal, genre of music got started? Grindcore makes Black Sabbath sound like Duran Duran.
Shrieking and growling voices, thumping drums and thrashing guitars; grindcore isn’t for the faint of heart. It’s best described as an extreme fusion of heavy metal and hardcore punk, and most tracks don’t last a minute. It’s somehow found a cult-like following all over the world, but it all started in a humble Birmingham pub.
The Mermaid
In the mid-80s, Sparkhill’s The Mermaid was a hub for all kinds of noisy music: heavy metal, anarcho-punk, post-punk, thrash, etc. If you liked your music loud, this was the place to be. But one band pushed the envelope further than ever before when the Meriden-based Napalm Death made their debut at The Mermaid in 1985.
With a musical style that took from post-punk, hardcore punk and thrash metal, made all the heavier by the “hyper-speed” drumming of Birmingham-born Mick Harris, Napalm Death essentially became the sole creators of grindcore in front of Birmingham’s very eyes.
It wasn’t long before they became The Mermaid’s de facto house band, while the pub also welcomed such iconic names as Conflict, Antisect, Swans and Circle Jerks. In fact, a hub for homemade fanzines, tapes and posters too, The Mermaid’s DIY aesthetics attracted punks and weirdos from all over the West Midlands and beyond.
Sadly, The Mermaid is no longer with us (it’s now empty after being an Indian restaurant), but Napalm Death is still going, having gone on to sell millions of records. The line-up has changed a bit, with Barney Greenway, from Great Barr, who joined in 1989, currently its longest-serving member.
Once again, no one does it harder, faster or heavier than Birmingham.
