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Adrian Nicholas Matthews Thaws (born 27 January 1968), better known by his stage name Tricky, is an English musician, record producer, vocalist and rapper. He was born and raised in Bristol, in southwest England. Through his work with Massive Attack and other artists, Tricky became a major figure in the Bristol underground scene, which gave rise to multiple internationally recognized artists and the music genre of trip hop.

Tricky embarked on a solo career with his debut album, Maxinquaye, in 1995. The release won Tricky popular acclaim and marked the beginning of a lengthy collaborative partnership with vocalist Martina Topley-Bird. He released four more studio albums before the end of the decade, including Pre-Millennium Tension and the pseudonymous Nearly God, both in 1996. He has gone on to release nine studio albums since 2000, most recently Different When It’s Silent (2026). In 2016, he joined Massive Attack on stage for the first time in two decades while continuing his solo career.

Tricky is a pioneer of trip hop music, and his work is noted for its dark, layered musical style that blends disparate cultural influences and genres, including hip-hop, alternative rock, and ragga. He has collaborated with a wide range of artists over the course of his career, including Terry Hall, Björk, Gravediggaz, Alanis Morissette, Grace Jones and PJ Harvey.

Early life

Tricky was born Adrian Nicholas Matthews Thaws on 27 January 1968 in Knowle West, Bristol, to a Jamaican father and a Ghanaian-English mother. His mother, Maxine Quaye, died either by suicide or due to epilepsy complications when Tricky was four. His father, Roy Thaws, operated the Studio 17 sound system (formerly known as "Tarzan the High Priest") with his brother Rupert and his own father, Hector. Bristol musician Bunny Marrett claimed in 2012, "It became the most popular sound system in Bristol at the time."

Tricky experienced a difficult childhood in Knowle West, an economically deprived area in Southern Bristol. He became involved in crime at an early age, joining a gang that was involved in car theft, burglary, fights, and promiscuity. Tricky spent his youth in the care of his grandmother, who often let him watch old horror films instead of going to school. At 15, he began to write lyrics ("I like to rock, I like to dance, I like pretty girls taking down their pants", MixMag, 1996). When he was 17, he spent some time in prison after purchasing forged £50 notes from a friend, who later informed the police. Tricky stated in an interview afterward, "Prison was really good. I'm never going back."

Career

1987–1994: The Wild Bunch, Massive Attack

In the mid-1980s, Tricky met DJ Milo and spent time with a sound system called the Wild Bunch, which, by 1987, evolved into Massive Attack. He received the nickname "Tricky Kid," and, at age 18, became a member of the Fresh 4, a rap group built from the Wild Bunch. He also rapped on Massive Attack's acclaimed debut album, Blue Lines (1991).

In 1991, before the release of Blue Lines, he met Martina Topley-Bird in Bristol. Some time later, she came to his house and mentioned to Tricky and Mark Stewart that she could sing. Martina was only 15 years old, but her "honey-coated vox" impressed them, and they recorded a song called "Aftermath" (although The Face '95 mentions that the first song they recorded together was called "Shoebox"). Tricky showed "Aftermath" to Massive Attack, but they were not interested. In 1993, he decided to press a few hundred vinyl copies of the song. In 1995, a white label record got him a contract with Island Records, and he started to record his first solo album, Maxinquaye.

1995–2001: Solo breakthrough

Tricky left Massive Attack to release his debut album, Maxinquaye, co-produced by himself and Mark Saunders and prominently featuring singer Martina Topley-Bird. The album was successful, and Tricky consequently attained international fame, something he was notably uncomfortable with. The Maxinquaye album review by Rolling Stone read: "Tricky devoured everything from American hip-hop and soul to reggae and the more melancholic strains of '80s British rock".

Authors David Hesmondhalgh and Caspar Melville wrote in the book Global Noise: Rap and Hip-Hop Outside the USA: "Tricky showed his debt to hip-hop aesthetics by reconstructualising samples and slices of both the most respected black music (Public Enemy) and the tackiest pop (quoting David Cassidy's "How Can I Be Sure?")." As the Rolling Stone article further explained, Tricky created "a mercurial style of dance music that immediately finds its own fast feet."