The Artist: Tricky
Tricky emerged from the shadows of 90s Britain.
Born Adrian Thaws in Bristol, he came up through the Wild Bunch sound system and worked with Massive Attack on Blue Lines - but Maxinquaye was something new, something of his own.
Named after his late mother, the album blurred identity, genre and gender. Tricky rapped in whispers, snarled in tongues and let his then-partner Martina Topley-Bird take centre stage. Her vocals delicate, defiant and hypnotic.
Tricky called it 'urban blues'. Critics called it trip-hop.
Tricky never chased the mainstream, but the mainstream came to him - even then didn’t know what to do with him. Uninterested in genre, uncomfortable in fame, he carved out a space of his own: jagged, cinematic and defiantly off-centre.
The Record: Maxinquaye (1995)
Right from the warped strings and rattling rhythm of Overcome, it’s clear this record is more shadow than spotlight.
Ponderosa sounds like paranoia with a pulse.
Hell is Round the Corner flips an Isaac Hayes sample into something sinister, slinking forward like a late-night threat.
Black Steel reimagines Public Enemy’s Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos as a punk-noir standoff - all distortion and urgency - with Martina’s voice calmly burning at the centre.
Aftermath floats like grief. Weightless. Suspended in reverb.
Strugglin’ stumbles through a broken city at dawn.
Every track feels like it’s decaying in real time - beautiful and battered.
Tricky’s voice mutates, multiplies, disappears.
Martina’s glows like a candle in a blackout.
It’s not clean. Not clear.
But it is unforgettable.
Play Now:
🔊 Spotify | Apple Music | YouTube
Start With:
- Hell is Round the Corner - Menacing, woozy, iconic
- Aftermath - Downbeat beauty
- Black Steel - Ferocious, chaotic, unforgettable