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New Faces: Tricky

David Sinclair, Rolling Stone, 10 August 1995

"YOU 'AVEN'T got any rizlas, 'ave you?" Tricky says, asking for rolling papers by way of an introduction. The 27-year-old rapper and songwriter — "I like to call myself a poet, really" — is buzzing around his apartment in upscale Kensington, in west London, like a bluebottle in a jam jar. He fields a barrage of calls with mounting irritation ("I'm doing it right now!") while brainstorming with a video director who wants to stick him on a crucifix and send him flying over the poorest areas of the world. "Wicked idea," Tricky says. "I don't want to give no messages, mind. Messages ain't my forte."

Total word count of piece: 562

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