BRILLIANT return to form from the Bristol-born trip-hop flaneur.
Like Baudelaire was to 19th century Paris, Tricky is to his 21st century arrondissement/neighbourhood - the quintessential modern urban observer of things going down. He has rarely seemed comfortable in his own skin and the celebrity that followed the success of his 1995 debut Maxinquaye was not worn well. Since that masterful stroke of controlled chaos Tricky has languished with the ups and downs of acting and music careers going nowhere fast.
Accompanying the release of False Idols this week he issued a statement which puts the new work in context: "I was lost for ages," he says. "I was trying to prove something to people, trying to do something to please other people and also myself at the same time, which is never going to work. To be honest with you, I've been floating around since Chris Blackwell and Island. This album is about me finding myself again."
Even the name of the album, False Idols, addresses his feelings about the lost years in a show biz wilderness with little to show for it. Putting his name on things that had little to do with him. The tracks on the menacing street noir of Maxinquaye (named after Tricky's late mother Maxin Quaye who died when he was four) were centred around the vocals of 15-year-old "find" Martina Topley-Bird and the new sessions have gone back to that formula in a sense using guest vocals from 24-year-old Londoner Francesca Belmonte and Fifi Rong throughout the work. Both singers record for the False Idols imprint - Tricky's new label. Nigeria's Nneka Egbuna and Peter Silberman (of The Antlers) also appear on the album while other familiar names brought into the mix through their music include Van Morrison (via Patti Smith's reading of "Gloria" / "Somebody's Sins"), David Sylvain ("Hey Love") and Rodgers and Hart ("Valentine"). The latter track is an "apology" to Bjork Tricky told Fact Magazine in an excellent interview (factmag. com/2013/04/25/false-idols-tricky-on-upsetting-jordanthatchers-legacy-and-that-glastonbury-appearance-with-beyonce/) that came out just prior to the album's release. Other than that personal note he has nothing to apologize for on False Idols.
UPCOMING CDS
June 4
Alice in Chains - The Devil Put Dinosaurs Here; Eleanor Friedberger - Personal Record; Kelly Rowland - Talk a Good Game; Queens of the Stone Age - ... Like Clockwork.
June 11
Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's Harvest; Smith Westerns - Soft Will; Surfer Blood - Pythons.
