These days, he's known as Sananda Maitreya and his music, quite a bit different and more stripped down than it was in the 1980s.
Then again, no one could make a louder impact with a debut album quite like his "former" persona did.
You see, back in 1988, Sananda Maitreya was better known as Terence Trent D'Arby, the name he was born with in 1962 in New York City and the name he grew up with in the central Florida town of De Land, the name he used as a younger man to box his way to a Golden Gloves championship, while fighting out of a famed church/gymnasium in Orlando.
Music, however, was D'Arby's passion. After one year of college at nearby University of Central Florida, D'Arby quit and joined the Army, was posted to Fort Sill, Okla., then assigned to the 3rd Armored Division in Frankfurt, West Germany. It was there he was part of a music group called The Touch. However, that time with the band took away from his time with his Army unit and in April 1983, D'Arby was court-martialed for going AWOL and was dishonorably discharged. D'Arby kept working with The Touch and even recorded songs with the band that would be the basis of a 1984 album, "Love On Time," which would get re-released in 1989 once D'Arby established himself.
D'Arby left West Germany and in 1986, relocated to London and joined another group, The Bojangels. It was there he worked a deal out to be a solo artist and in 1987, he was signed to Columbia Records. D'Arby and co-producers Martyn Ware and Howard Grey worked on the first album, an album that took a few months to put together. When it was finally all recorded, mixed and placed on an album, it was released in the summer of 1987, first in England.
The album had a pretty complex title -- "Introducing The Hardline According to Terence Trent D'Arby."
No doubt a mouthful. It contained all songs written by D'Arby with the exception of the Smokey Robinson classic "Who's Lovin' You." The album featured the seductiveness of "Sign Your Name," to the rousing James Brown soundalike "Dance Little Sister" to the pop sound that got him established on "If You Let Me Stay." In the UK, "If You Let Me Stay" hit No. 2, but in the U.S., it never caught on, peaking at No. 67.
A bit of a concern for an album/CD hitting it big overseas, but not on D'Arby's born soil of America. D'Arby was assured that his album would be a huge success, but he also went a step too far, calling his album "the most important one since the Beatles' 'Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band'" album in 1967.
He was called everything from brash to cocky to arrogant and his statement rubbed those in music and in the media wrong. Now, though, he had to prove he had a winning song on an album that he just gave huge praise to.
The next release in the UK was the sassy "Wishing Well." It did well, too, there, peaking at No. 4, featuring D'Arby's rough vocals against a simple music backdrop of song co-writer Sean Oliver's bass guitar and D'Arby's own drum syncopation. But the most memorable part of the song is that melodic whistle-sounding keyboard that made it irresistible and one of the most memorable songs of the 1980s.
In the U.S., D'Arby and Columbia had nothing to lose. It hit the Billboard Hot 100 on January 16, 1988, debuting at No. 79. From there, the song rose modestly until the week of February 27, 1988, when it made its Top 40 debut at No. 40. From there, it would be a two-month excursion up the Top 40 while D'Arby was basking in the glow of being nominated for a Grammy for Best New Artist and winning a Grammy for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Male for the album.
It moved from No. 40 to No. 35 to No. 27 to No. 20 to No. 17 to No. 12 by April 2, 1988. The next week, D'Arby moved up from No. 12 to No. 10 to become the 25-year-old's first Top 10 hit. But it wasn't done yet.
The next week, D'Arby made a big leap of five notches from No. 10 to No. 5. By now, it was becoming clear that "Hardline" was about to have a "talked-about" No. 1 hit. It was only a matter of time. It jumped from No. 5 to No. 4 to No. 2 and finally, the week of May 7, 1988, the 17th week on the Billboard Hot 100, D'Arby had his first No. 1 song, spending one week at the time.
When talking about the song, Ben Green of The New Yorker credited D'Arby's songs from "Hardline" for "bringing soul music into the 1980s." The hip-hop sound was becoming clearer as the '80s were leaving and the '90s were arriving. D'Arby's sound, especially on "Wishing Well," was fresh and hip and helped to lead the revolution.
D'Arby's newly minted No. 1 hit also helped spark "Hardline" to its peak position of No. 4 on the Top 200 album chart the same week. And from there, D'Arby's success soared. He went to No. 4 with "Sign Your Name," which had peaked at No. 2 in the UK and then went to No. 30 here with "Dance Little Sister," a Top 20 UK hit.
However, little did D'Arby or anyone else know that the singer's mega-success was only going to last that one album. In 1989, "Neither Fish Nor Flesh" only got as high as No. 12 in the UK and No. 61 on the U.S. album chart. And though "Sympathy Or Damn" would give D'Arby another Top 5 album in the UK, it only got as high as No. 119 in the U.S.
As far as songs were considered, D'Arby would never match the success of the songs from "Hardline." He had five more Top 20 hits in the UK, but none of them would crack the Top 10. In the U.S., D'Arby had one more chart single as "Delicate," a duet with up-and-coming British singer Des'ree, peaked at No. 74 in 1994. D'Arby, though, did co-write "Letting Go" with Hans Zimmer for the Robert DeNiro/Wesley Snipes movie The Fan.
In 2001 and his best works well behind him, D'Arby made a personal decision in his life. Declaring that "Terence Trent D'Arby was dead... he watched his suffering as he died a noble death," D'Arby legally changed his name to Sananda Francesco Maitreya.
His music is far more stripped down compared to the slick songs he wrote and co-produced on "Hardline." He's released eight CDs under his new name over the last 14 years, the most recent being 2014's "The Rise of the Zugebrian Time Lords," and none have charted. Part of the reason for that is that Maitreya's works these days are being sold online through his own record company.
The artist formerly known as Terence Trent D'Arby continued to do work on movie soundtracks with songs in such films over the years as Frankie And Johnny, Beverly Hills Cop III and Knocked Up.
Sananda Maitreya continues to keep busy in his early 50s. But as Terence Trent D'Arby, he was the hottest thing going in 1988 -- thanks to a song with a memorable melodic hook that will live on for generations to come from an album he unabashedly said was as important as the Beatles' most famous work.
It was quite a time to be him then.
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