90's Hit Parade #89

Tricky - Ponderosa

The first time I heard this song, I was hanging out with some friends at our friend Allison's apartment in Athens after a night on the town, where she played us some of both his debut Maxiniquaye, from which this song is taken, and his collaborative project Nearly God, and I have to admit that Tricky's music has never sounded quite as good as it did in that late night listening session. There's something about Tricky, and this song in particular, that seems very specifically late night. The percussion drips like multiple leaks from a damaged ceiling on a rainy night (Beck ripped this beat off the following year for "Derelict"), and the lyrics describe a series of images that drift by, repeating themselves and landing on different beats at different points in the song. It's a song that you wander through like a David Lynch dream sequence.