When someone passes away, despite all your efforts to hold them here, your mind churns with regrets that linger like ghosts in a quiet house. Apologies rise from the recesses of memory—the times you couldn’t be there, the words you left unsaid, the moments when help came too late or not at all. Each thought presses with a dull weight, a futile grasping for ways to rewrite a reality that can’t be altered. You’re left with the ache of missed chances, knowing that love, so deep and frail, sometimes arrives just one heartbeat too late.
The aching weight of grief pulses through Detroit’s Tiffadelic in I Tried, a raw darkwave track, and wrenching testament to the pain of trying, yet failing, to save a friendship slipping away. Dedicated to Tiffadelic’s late best friend, lost this year to liver failure, I Tried echoes with the heavy toll of love and irretrievable loss. Tiffadelic draws inspiration from Gary Numan, John Maus, Ian Curtis, Jim Morrison, and Grace Slick. Stripped back and chilling, yet vibrating with unspoken emotion, the track also evokes the stark, minimalist tones of Cold Cave, Cold Showers, and Creux Lies.
Tiffadelic’s voice carries sorrow’s weight, each note threaded with regret and tenderness, inviting listeners into a grief that feels both personal and deeply shared. It’s a heartfelt confession, a captured instant of loss that speaks to the fragile beauty of love and the unyielding sting of farewell. As a Black queer artist, Tiffadelic embodies an eccentric, mysterious presence that bends the boundaries of earthly expectation. Their artistry beckons audiences into strange, otherworldly realms—a place where the conventional dissolves and imagination reigns supreme. In Tiffadelic’s world, creativity becomes a portal, an uncharted space that defies definition, brimming with allure, anguish, and the raw pulse of life itself.
The track lingers with power and sadness, marrying raw lyrics with a haunting, stripped-down melody that cuts straight to the heart. It’s an honest tribute to friendship’s enduring strength and the bitter reality of absence, blending words and sound into something both delicate and unyielding. With each note, I Tried reaches through the pain, creating a musical echo of memory and love.
Watch the video for “I Tried” below:
