Black Merda

by Steve Huey
Black Merda was a funky rock combo with a significant debt to Jimi Hendrix, mixing fuzz-toned, psychedelic blues-rock with folky acoustic passages and contemporary late-60s soul. Featuring guitarists Anthony and Charles Hawkins, bassist Veesee L. Veasey, and drummer Tyrone Hite, the group got its start in Mississippi but traveled to Chicago to record for Chess, issuing a self-titled debut album in 1967. The following year, they were linked to another psychedelic soul group on Chess, Fugi, and their debut album Mary, Dont Take Me on No Bad Trip; some accounts say the bands were one and the same, others list Black Merda simply as producers. Shortening their name to Mer-Da, the group returned in 1971 with Long Burn the Fire, a funkier outing for Janus that bore a likeness to early Funkadelic.