British artist xTRIXSTEx looks to bring his beats across the water

​J-Lee Triste, the artist known as xTRIXSTEx, broke out big in England in 2020 with 10 singles. Now he is seeking to develop a fan base in a wider world that includes the United States, and his single “Is This Real” will be the opening shot.

“Is This Real” drops August 27.

“I want a fan base to engage with,” he said. “If there are concerts, and stuff you can do cool things like hand things out to people and give to the community, yeah, it would be nice.”

Also, he says, “It'd be really nice to have an audience and a fan base because you know that those people relate to you.”

His musical history is rooted in the ’60s and ’70s “Motown kind of Northern soul,” he said.

“Soul especially. That was mostly my upbringing.”

The music he creates has within it “everything from ’80s synth pop to alternative R&B to trap-focused rap.”

“My main plan for the music, and the whole reason I want to be able to reach people out there, is to help show people that they are not alone, and that people shouldn’t be suffering the way they are in life with depression and mental health,” he said.

His artist name, xTRIXSTEx, pronounced ex-tricks-tex, partially reflects that struggle. The x’s, interspersed with his family name, represent the isolation that comes with clinical depression.

He knows a lot about depression, and music has provided refuge and healing. Without music, he says, and being able to make music, “I wouldn’t be here.”

Making music, he said, was at first “just something that allowed me to pass time by making boom-bap backing tracks rather than getting caught up in the spirals of my depression and problems I was facing emotionally.”

“I hope my music can motivate any others out there and give them that last bit of hope they need to hang on and stay for the ride,” he said.

He says he loves making hip-hop and trap music, especially the heart-thumping rhythms of 808 beats and what he calls trap vibes from Drake, Juice WRLD and Lil Peep, but it also reflects other influences — R&B and hip-hop.

His releases range from laid back pop reflections, to bouncy pop melodies and some hardcore rap, including the free style “Troublesome.”

He writes his own lyrics and produces, mainly, his own beats.

“I do the mixing and mastering, but sometimes I’m lazy and maybe do like a tiny bit of the backing beat and then the rest of my parcel is singing. Then I just mix and master the vocals and then they’re ready.”

Triste (pronounced trist) is 23 and a student studying computer science, but “all my spare time is spent producing tracks, writing lyrics, mixing and mastering as well as recording the vocals.”

Music for him is, he says, “usually a release.”

“I've always found I had like an emotional connection, like if there's a really good performance and it would be over, I sometimes tear up.”

He is compiling an album and looks forward to performing live. He has played in pubs. Not many, because, he said, “I’ve still got quite a bit of stage fright.”

But he will overcome it. “Oh yeah,” he said. “I reckon, over time. Something every one has to go through is a bit of roller coaster.”

Besides that, the pub performances were enjoyable.

“It was fun actually,” he said, with the live vibe and the loudness providing “new get into the music.”

That is one reason he is willing to put out the effort to make a push to go big with his music. “Imagine being able to sing in front of loads of people,” he said.

Another is this: “It'd be really cool to meet other artists, and opening doors and new windows in a career – it's like a career I'd rather do than sit behind a desk all my life.”

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