Remember Boy, You're a Superstar!

Like the Impostume, I don't subscribe to the view that all Tricky records after Maxinquaye are (cue tell-tale NMEism) 'self-indulgent'. Pre-Millennium Tension and Nearly God are brilliantly cracked little puzzles, full of holes and hidden moments of cold beauty. Most people's cut-off point, Angels with Dirty Faces is also (mostly) excellent - for the first two-thirds it seems like a bizarre Krautrock-G Funk hybrid, with clattering rhythms slipping from panic-attack speed to an incongrous Dr Dre lope - interrupted by the chilling death march of 'Broken Homes', a dissection of misogyny and a worryingly controlled bit of simmering resentment without equal in the coked-up vacuity of the late 90s. Irrespective of the fact that by this point Mr Thaws was clearly not a well man, lots of the criticism seemed pretty foul - from 'OMG black man does rock' to 'uppity employee slags off record companies' and finally 'but where are the tunes?'



The 'tunes' were actually out in force on Juxtapose, which was in places almost jolly, with sly anti-gangsta rhetoric ('your profile's too big, how are you going to be a crime family?) and Swizz Beats-esque music. Where I stopped was on Blowback, where it all got a bit overly American, where the aim to sound 'optimistic' began to remind of all those Sly Stone records after Riot where he seemed to be protesting his happiness far too much. Anyway - Knowle West Boy is almost entirely great (almost - there's always a couple of appalling lapses with every Tricky LP, that's part of the fun). Much of it seems to be, as per 'Brand New You're Retro', an indictment of the continued drabness and paucity of imagination of British rock. 'Council Estate', from its Peter Hook bassline on, is a demonstration of how it's done to all those allegedly 'influenced' by 'post-punk', in that it shows - with its echoes, vortices, and splicing of shouty anger and studio manipulation - that anything a 'live band playing together' can do, a producer with an idea or two can do a million times better. The album is full of montage, of stuff thrown together that shouldn't work - punkish guitars, the usual mutterings and marital arguments, dancehall chat and effeminate synthpop Numan/Moog-string refrains - but it's never merely eclectic.

UPDATE: This is very true:
The underlying disadvantage for Tricky is that basically he’s a brilliant songwriter, basically a pop and rock artist, effectively where Indy should be now, occupying the place that Coldplay and the Killers occupy, but he’s assessed from the wrong perspective. He’s completely mainstream, or would be if it weren’t for the Britpop counterrevolution. In an alternate and much more interesting Universe he’s headlining Glastonbury instead of Jay-Z and Liam Gallagher is still roadying for the Inspiral Carpets.