Terence Trent D'Arby

There was a young man who claimed that his debut solo album was the the most important album since the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper. The world paid attention. At least for a while.

Terence Trent D'Arby was born Terence Trent Howard in Manhattan in 1962. His mother was a gospel singer and teacher and he was raised by his stepfather, since his biological father was already married. The family moved from NY to New Jersey, to Chicago and then to Florida, where they finally settled near Orlando. There, Terence trained as a boxer and won the Florida lightweight championship. He received an offer to attend boxing school in the US Army, but he went to college instead. A year later he changed his mind, quit college and enlisted in the army. He was dishonorably discharged by the army in April 1983 after going AWOL. Obviously, this guy could not stand still.

He released Introducing The Hardline According To Terence Trent D'Arby in 1987 and as I have already mentioned, he thought very highly of it. It was definitely no Sgt. Pepper, but it was a very good album nonetheless. It went to #1 in the UK, Switzerland and Australia, #2 in New Zealand and the Netherlands, #4 in the US, Norway and Austria and #5 in Sweden. The sales were even more impressive: 5x Platinum in the UK, 2x Platinum in the US & Canada. It also did quite well award-wise: he received a Grammy for Best R&B Vocal Performance, Male.

The first single was If You Let Me Stay, a #7 hit in the UK:

Wishing Well was the biggest hit, #1 US & #4 UK:

Sign Your Name was also big, #4 US & #2 UK:

Two years later, there was another record, “Neither Fish Nor Flesh,” a compelling sidestep that frontloaded three long ballads, and, as a result, blunted the force of the balance of the album. The mixed reception to the record also effectively killed D’Arby’s commercial momentum. It is this album that contains the song that will be our subject today.

Billy Don't Fall was released as a single, but was not successful. In it, Terence talks about a (real? imaginary?) gay friend, who's falling in love with the narrator. The narrator gently reminds him that he is straight and does not love him this way, but that he will always be his friend. The song has a sad ending. Here are the lyrics:

Billy was a young boy

Who's fate did decree

That he would like only other boys

So being with a boy came to him naturally

Billy was a green boy

His thoughts so naive

He wondered why he was so victimised

And his fear brought him close to me suddenly

But

Billy my friend

Don't fall in love with me

I'm not that kind of guy

But I'll stand by your side

If you need me to be

But

Billy my friend

Don't fall in love with me

Though it can't be wrong to be

To be what you are

Billy was a sick boy

His life fading to grey

He tried to grab for straws of family

But his loved ones turned young Billy away

Billy died a young man

His face to the wind

And of the things I regret the most

Was seeing how hate and fear killed a friend

But

Billy my friend

Don't fall in love with me

I'm not that kind of guy

But I'll stand by your side

If you need me to be

But

Billy my friend

Don't fall in love with me

Though it can't be wrong to be

To be what you are

I couldn't find the studio version on youtube, so here are two live versions of the song.

This is in Hollywood, 1990:

This is in Milan, Italy, 1993:

Then there were two more records, “Symphony or Damn,” in 1993, and “TTD’s Vibrator,” in 1995, uneven releases that seemed, at the time, like object lessons in diminishing returns. D’Arby didn’t want to play the superstar game, at least the way it was supposed to be played; he could be silly one moment and solemn the next, and he had a penchant for releasing singles with B-sides that were little more than wordless piano improvisations. And then he vanished, or so it seemed.

When D’Arby returned, in 2001, he had a new album, an independently released opus called “Wildcard” and a new name, Sananda Maitreya. “Terence Trent D’Arby was dead,” he said. “He watched his suffering as he died a noble death. After intense pain I meditated for a new spirit, a new will, a new identity.”

There were other changes, too. After the slow demise of his major-label career, Maitreya moved to Munich and then Milan, where he settled in 2002. In Milan, he started to make music again, creating it mostly on his own and distributing his songs primarily through his Web site. He's still making music, some of it quite interesting, today.