Tricky doesn't say no to much. Lifestylewise, the British trip-hop pioneer once proclaimed "I smoke 'til I'm senseless."

But he did just say no to Madonna when she asked him to lend his talents to her latest Ray Of Light album.

"I'm not what she needs," the famously frog-throated Tricky croaks, over the phone from New York City this past week.

"She sells millions and millions of records. I could help her not sell records. I could help her be non-radio friendly."

Tricky -- who plays the Warehouse Monday night -- has a point.

From his beginnings in the early '90s as an oddball Bristol hip-hopper with a chequered past, through his mid-'90s status as producer du jour, right up to the murky, claustrophobic beats found on his new album Angels With Dirty Faces, the singer has never been what you'd call commercially accessible.

It takes a principled man to turn down the kind of money you could get in return for the Madonnafication of a song or two.

Tricky lays down the rhyme and reason: He was afraid his work would be remixed to sound "nicer."

"That happened with me and Neneh Cherry and I still hardly speak to her," he says. "I get hurt easily when it's about music. There should be no disputes. I don't even want to go there with Madonna."

Besides, wonders Tricky, what else is in it for him?

"I think she's the queen of doing videos," he muses. "Visually brilliant. She looks cool when you know she's not at all. Maybe she can give me some of that. Make me f---in' big. That would be more interesting than just getting royalty cheques coming in quick and thick."

The famously erratic Tricky is known as a tough interview -- if he agrees to be interviewed at all. In our conversation, he is friendly, upbeat, upfront, and, uh, wordy.

He's candid about past collaborations. PJ Harvey, Elvis Costello, and former flame Bjoerk were good ones. Bush's Gavin Rossdale was not. ("I don't really like the guy. He's not a soul man. He's a wanna-be-loved-man, an image man. I'm into people like Kurt Cobain, the real f---ing deal.")

He says the hard-edge sounds on Angels With Dirty Faces were inspired by his stint performing on the Lollapalooza tour last year.

"We had to go out in front of Korn's fans on that tour, d'y'know wha' I mean?" he says. "We needed ammunition. Something that could rock people's heads off."

The record's lean toward gospel and soul, that mirrors Tricky's feelings about American hip-hop's often shallow image.

"The black community need some real lyrics, man," he says. "Some real, honest lyrics. People should hear something better than boast raps. 'I've got a Range Rover' or 'Will you be my pony.'

"Please," he adds, laughing. "They come off like sex animals saying 'bitch' and talking about guns when everyone knows they're gay as f---. I ain't got a problem with gay men at all, but it's just such a facade."

And, just as Tricky's verbal cannonade starts to sound a bit loose, he fastens his artillery back down to the deck.

"I'm just starting to get my first black press," he says. "Young black kids need to know they don't have to go along with that same bulls--- to express themselves. I don't want diamond rings, and I don't want rottweilers and I don't want guns. You don't put your money into that. You buy property and you send your kid to a good school."

He adds: "I've learned so much from America, but it's made me quite pessimistic. I used to want to change the world. Now I realized you ain't got a chance. So, I'm going to try and change the music industry."