Tricky - Maxinquaye

Perhaps Tricky’s only truly great album, and due in no small part to Martina Topley-Bird’s vocal contribution, ‘Maxinquaye’ was the Bristol rapper’s debut and remains a dark, paranoid classic.

Part of the city’s Wild Bunch sound system, Tricky first came to greater attention on Massive Attack’s ‘Blue Lines’ and ‘Protection’ albums before spinning off into a solo career.

Containing classics ‘Overcome’, ‘Ponderosa’, ‘Hell Is Round The Corner’ (using the same Isaac Hayes sample as Portishead’s ‘Glory Box’), and a rock version of Public Enemy’s ‘Black Steel In The Hour Of Chaos’, ‘Maxinquaye’ was a fractured cousin to Massive Attack, Portishead and a raft of imitators’ sound, their hazily stoned trip-hop gone paranoid and schitzo.

9/10

Words by Nick Annan