INTERVIEW: TRICKY YOUTH

THE NÜ NÜ METAL ARTIST PLAYED AT LAST YEAR’S GATHERING OF THE JUGGALOS

For me, the nicest surprise of 2022 came while surfing The Gathering of The Juggalo’s website. It’s something I do every year. It’s always interesting to check out what nü metal bands, old school rappers and mid-career comedians end up playing alongside Insane Clown Posse. Towards the bottom of the lineup page, a surprising name popped up: Tricky Youth. I can’t remember how I reacted, but I probably made some kind of noise.

Speaking of noise: Tricky Youth has been inside of various noise and punk communities in New York City for a long time now. It’s where he grew up. I think the first time I met Tricky was during a show at the somewhat legendary Bushwick club and hookah bar Passions Lounge. We talked rap rock. Since that time, he has followed the classic DIY trajectory. He’s toured and released tapes and slowly chiseled out his own sound, which could get play at a digital hardcore warehouse or an internet rap concert or a Hot Topic in 1998. Or at The Gathering of The Juggalos.

Along with that performance at The Gathering, the culmination of Tricky Youth’s years of R&D is his debut full-length The Further Down We Go, The Less I Recognize. Made with the producer So Drove, it’s a tight seven track rager. The hooks are big and the styles pile on. There’s even a guest turn from Memphis rap legend Lil Wyte. But I don’t need to say much more. Tricky’s got it covered.

What was your entry point into nü metal and rap rock? Was that the shit you were listening to as a kid? Or did you sort of discover it retroactively? 

Oh I mean, it was definitely my first real, visceral experience with rock music, hearing Bizkit and Korn on the radio, seeing Manson and Nine Inch Nails videos on TV. There’s this clip of Henry Rollins–on one of the thousand VH1 shows they got him on to talk about random shit–where he’s talking about how the nü metal formula of sick opening riff, drop down for the rap part, big slam chorus, rap again, chorus again, huge breakdown, chorus again is perfect for young people, particularly young boys, and he’s right; but I think one underrated thing about the mainstream heavy stuff from that era is how much a lot of it directly drew from some pretty underground and pretty wild stuff. 

So, like for a lot of people my age, all of that wound up being the gateway to more extreme and challenging sounds, like the industrial, thrash, punk, darker rap, death metal and experimental music of the 80s and 90s, and then to the contemporary underground music that came from that. And I just soaked it all up and became a student of it, and eventually came back around to looking at the rap rock and nü metal I listened to as a kid through that same lens. I remember one of the first in-depth conversations you and I ever had was about my belief that Odelay by Beck and Devil Without a Cause by Kid Rock are the same record, but made for two different audiences, and both descendants of the License to Ill tree. So those are the kind of thoughts that populate my brain on a day-to-day basis. 

How did you get onto The Gathering of The Juggalos last year? What was that whole experience like? Did you learn any lessons?

I reached out to them and they were really enthusiastic about having me… And then it almost didn’t happen. I flew down there, went to the stage I was supposed to play on Friday afternoon, and then the thunderstorms started, flood warnings, all of that… They were like, “We’re gonna have to cut this stage and everyone who was supposed to play in the daytime if this doesn’t let up.” And it was like, oh man, what a cruel irony, came down to play The Gathering, this total dream come true, and then it fucking rains out. But then it cleared up, and the MC of the stage, Stockwell, goes “Okay, they wanna cut all of your sets for time but I’m not letting that happen, I'm calling an audible here and you’re all gonna play.” So everyone just kind of had to get up there and play short sets one after the other, no breaks in between. And it was honestly incredible. My friend Alicia tattooed me on stage, and I got to shout out my friend Will Leffler a.k.a. Mind Detergent, the dearly departed American legend. The crowd there values honesty; sometimes what I do is too raw for people, but not the Juggalos. That’s who I think of when I make this music. So shoutout to that dude, for real. Shoutout Stockwell. The lesson learned is that the family will always have your back. 

You seem to be connecting the dots between a lot of different styles on your new record: nü metal; Memphis rap; industrial; more contemporary internet stuff. What was your mindstate when you were making it with So Drove?

I mean, that was really the idea; like I was saying before, my favorite thing about nü metal, rap rock, industrial rock, all that 90s/early 2000s crossover stuff, is how it connected the dots between all these different styles, and drew from all these different pieces of the past and the underground. So that’s what I wanted to do on this album. One of the things me and So Drove bond over the most is that we’re both students of the game. I’m a student of the game who came out all fucked up; so I wanted to create this cracked-mirror version of nü metal and rap rock, as I saw it, and make this perfect 1999-style album. You listen to Significant Other and it’s total collage music, all these sounds from different genres layered together into this one cohesive, distinctive thing, and that’s what I wanted to do on this album–bring all these influences together, weaving Three Six Mafia, Godflesh, Smashing Pumpkins, Morbid Angel, Def Jux, and whatever else made me who I am into this insane sonic mash-up. 

What prompted you to get Lil Wyte on a song?

When we were making the album, “Death Rattle” really felt like the heart of the whole thing, where it married two of my biggest influences–90s Memphis rap with this big nü metal chorus–in a way that felt really natural and that I’d always wanted to do because I’d never heard anyone do it. So Drove was the one who was like, “Why don’t we get a Memphis OG on this?” And immediately it was like, fuck, let’s get Lil Wyte on this. Like, if you wanna talk about a predecessor to my style, fuck, that’s it right there. 

So we reached out to his people, sent them the song, and he was hyped on it and sent back this fucking incredible verse about giving the artists who influenced this generation their flowers, and wondering what your purpose is but still doing your life’s work regardless; just walking the path no matter how fucked up things get. I remember the first time I listened to it, I just thought to myself, fuck, that ties together this whole fucking album. The lyrics that tie the whole shit together, and I didn’t even write them. There’s something magical about that. 

You live in Los Angeles now and seem to be in a good place. How did your experience running around New York City as a kid inform your lyrical choices on this record? “Scott Strapped” always felt like a movie.

There’s a lot of reflection on the record, musically and lyrically. It’s funny, the theme of the album can really be summed up as “How the fuck did we get here?” Taking a moment to retrace my steps. So in a way, the sounds on the record drawing so heavily on the influences that shaped me mirror me telling that story lyrically. My time as a kid in New York City running around with a huge chip on his shoulder is where it starts. That kid was a little fucker, but I also know he was in a lot of pain. That’s the kid that wrote “Scott Strapped.” Full of bravado and chest-beating, yelling to be heard. And he was absolutely a pain in everyone’s ass, including and maybe especially mine. But I forgive that kid. I think a lot of this album is forgiving that kid, forgiving other people who that kid was mad at, and also making amends to them. And then just being grateful for the people who are still here after the shitstorm of the last few years. 

You got anything else in the pipeline? Where do you see Tricky Youth music going next? What’s the deal with the whole corpse paint development?

The corpse paint thing, it really just came about naturally. It might sound like pure lore, but it’s not–I just started smearing paint on my face one night, and eventually it began to channel Dead from Mayhem, and I just kept going with it. Then I went up on a hill nearby and lit a candle and said a prayer, and I just felt at peace. I created this character of “The Harvester” to help me process grief and loss and what was going on with me mentally in a way that I didn’t feel that I could alone; sort of a mythopoetic thing. And it’s helped. I generally don’t like seeing pictures of my face on social media. I don’t really like pictures of my face at all. I have terrible anxiety. I shake when I perform. It’s actually gotten worse over the years, not better. I have trouble looking at the audience. So it was a way to become comfortable in my own skin, to kind of put on a mask, to assume a persona, and it worked; when I’m onstage none of those things are negatives, they just “are,” and I can accept myself for once and actually be myself as I see myself. I can shake and scream and rap the most demented shit and everything feels right.

So as far as what’s next, everything before right now kind of feels like a prelude. I did all the processing and soul-searching on Further. Now we’re here, and I’m in a place where I just feel free to create and see where it goes. It’s exciting. I’ve got new stuff on the way with Schwarz (So Drove), and I’m working on some stuff with DJ Rozwell of KFC Murder Chicks. My next full-length is about 75% written. It’s heavier, darker stuff, somewhere between Mystifier, Godflesh, and DJ Paul. I’ve been making stuff that’s kind of like the band Bonde Do Role, just these blown-out samples of heavy riffs I’ve recorded run through a sampler and set to fucked up drum machine beats with distortion-pedal rapping. I’ve also been writing a lot of acoustic songs like “A Gift” for a project, too, we’ll see where that goes. At this point, I just feel free to do pretty much whatever the fuck I want, and I can’t wait to do all of that, and to take it out on the road again. 

What is your diet and exercise routine looking like nowadays?

Something like 50 grams of fat a day, 300 grams of carbs, 200 grams of protein, eating smaller meals about every three hours, getting in the gym five times a week to lift, higher rep, medium weight. I’m not super strict about any of it at this current moment, but I’ve conditioned myself and my body for that to be the framework of my “normal” days. Keto is stupid, starving yourself is stupid, I think it’s best to just educate yourself about the nutrients in what you eat throughout the day, find foods you like that nourish you, and then just work out. That looks different for everyone. 

Regardless of all that, my favorite spot in LA is a soul food spot called Comfort LA, it’s on 7th and Kohler. My other favorite spot is this vegan hippie LA ass spot called Café Gratitude, where all the things on the menu are called like, “I Am Loving” and “I Am Enlightened” and you have to order them like that. If you don’t, and say something like, “I’ll have the forbidden black rice bowl” the servers will still say “Okay, so You Are Loving.” They also ask you a philosophical question of the day when they take your order. It’s amazing. I fucking love living in LA. The “I Am Loving,” by the way, is straight-up crack, and I can say that from experience with both.

The Further Down We Go, The Less I Recognize is out now on PSNEAKY Records. Tricky Youth on Instagram and Twitter