Fall to Pieces by Tricky

Whereas the album at #31 was bubbly, dancey and fun, the album at #30 is the polar opposite: dark and moody — and if you dig a little deeper on it, depressing.

Adrian Nicholas Matthews Thaws, aka Tricky, has been around a long time, and he’s had his share of tough times. His stellar 1995 debut album Maxinquaye was rooted in feelings about his mother, who had died when he was only four years old. Just a month after the release of that album, his daughter Mina Mazy was born. Tricky’s musical career has shadowed his daughter’s life ever since, each progressing through ups and downs over the 24+ years from her birth.

Sadly, Mazy took her own life in May 2019, and it hit Tricky as it would any parent who’s child has died. He receded from the public eye, pulled into himself, and didn’t write anything for a long while. He eventually turned back to music, just as the global pandemic was warming up. The 13 albums he’d released up until her death were the end of a 24-year chapter in his life. (Check out his album False Idols at #30 back on the Top 31 of 2013.) Fall to Pieces, released in September 2020, is the result of all that pain and suffering, and the beginning of the next chapter.

On the surface, the album feels very Tricky. He is the master of trip hop, after all, and he doesn’t let his longtime fans down here. But the lyrics and stories the album builds over its scant 28 minutes leave you with a sense of foreboding and loneliness that hit exactly the right target for me over the last year. I sometimes seek out music that expands upon my inner darkness — it helps to spill it out into the world, get it out of my head and into my surrounding space (even if it is just in my headphones).

Yesterday I watched this great KEXP at home performance and interview with Tricky. After a handful of remote video songs, Tricky and DJ Larry Mizelle, Jr talk about his career and what went into making this album. Tricky is quite humble, and forthcoming about his journey after the death of his daughter. He’s in therapy for the first time (at 52!), and he’s nowhere near the end of recovering from the loss.

“I’m getting stronger. The secret now is finding what the point is of being here. I’m getting there, gradually.”

He also talks about the new material he’s started working on with the legendary Lee “Scratch” Perry, for a future album he’s already named Lonely Guess which will hopefully come out this year. While we anxiously await that new material, check out the moving Fall to Pieces. It’s short, and worth every minute.

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1. Saint Cloud by Waxahatchee
2. Fetch The Bolt Cutters by Fiona Apple
3. Punisher by Phoebe Bridgers
4. folklore + evermore by Taylor Swift
5. Untitled (Black Is) + Untitled (Rise) by Sault
6. RTJ4 by Run The Jewels
7. Shore by Fleet Foxes
8. Serpentine Prison by Matt Berninger
9. The Ascension by Sufjan Stevens
10. Making a Door Less Open by Car Seat Headrest
11. Dreamland by Glass Animals
12. A Hero’s Death by Fontaines D.C.
13. Song Machine, Season One: Strange Timez by Gorillaz
14. Mordechai + Texas Sun EP by Khruangbin
15. Introduction, Presence by Nation of Language
16. Free Love by Sylvan Esso
17. Miss Anthropocene by Grimes
18. 3.15.20 by Childish Gambino
19. Women In Music Pt. III by HAIM
20. The Third Mind by The Third Mind
21. Superstar by Caroline Rose
22. Impossible Weight by Deep Sea Diver
23. We Will Always Love You by The Avalanches
24. Ultra Mono by IDLES
25. Visions of Bodies Being Burned by clipping.
26. Thin Mind by Wolf Parade
27. The Loves of Your Life by Hamilton Leithauser
28. Palo Alto (Live) by Thelonious Monk
29. color theory by Soccer Mommy
30. Fall to Pieces by Tricky
31. Quarantine Casanova by Chromeo

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