2007
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British-Sri Lankan rapper, singer-songwriter M.I.A. Poses during a photocall to present the film "MATANGI / MAYA / M.I.A." in the Panorama category,... GERMANY-BERLINALE-FILM-FESTIVAL Master P and Mia X perform onstage during the No Limit Reunion Tour at 2020 Funkfest at Legion Field on November 07, 2020 in Birmingham, Alabama.
Oct 4, 2018 · As the daughter of a Tamil revolutionary leader, activism and outspokenness run in Maya Arulpragasam 's blood. The genre-bending rapper, better known as M.I.A., was one of the first women in pop's ...
- “Pull Up The People”
- “Teqkilla”
- “Bamboo Banga”
- “Born Free”
- “Bring The Noize”
- “Matangi”
- “Bucky Done Gun”
- “Paper Planes”
- “Galang”
- “Bad Girls”
“Pull Up The People” acts as a starting point for M.I.A.’s critique of the government. While surveillance and privacy issues are of high concern in a lot of her more recent music, poverty reigns over Arular. But what makes this track so great is its sparseness — naked synths loom under calmly delivered rapping, a prime example of how anger and tran...
Industrial and dancehall were strange bedfellows before you-know-who made you-know-what, but M.I.A. trail-blazed making the odd combo palatable with “Teqkilla.” But it’s not just her ability to incorporate tinny, off-kilter synths with something both stark and danceable that make it stand out, it’s the lyrical tricks she pulls on the track, too. By...
Kalafeels like a relic in 2013. A lot of the material has aged poorly, songs like “Bird Flu” and “Boyz” sounding a little bit messy after hearing more of what meticulous soundscapes M.I.A. can construct. But “Bamboo Banga,” with its third-world roll call and Modern Lovers-referencing intro, transcends itself as mission statement for the album and c...
In the M.I.A. and Suicide Venn diagram, decay falls in the middle. Both tend to favor stony vocals and festering synths, so her deployment of the band’s “Ghost Rider” for “Born Free” is an unrivaled example of her sample-selection excellence. At the time of release, noise-pop duo Sleigh Bells were her proteges and here teacher becomes student only ...
M.I.A.’s no rappity-rapper but on “Bring The Noize” she sprays ferocious mouthfuls and delivers her closest example of “real hip-hop.” But even when she’s doing the old look how well I rhymetrick, she’s is still inherently herself, calling herself the Goddess Mathangi, who controls speech, art, and music. Other powers are invoked here, too, but it’...
If the title track from Matangi was on the version of the LP Interscope put on ice for being “too positive,” then they weren’t listening, because here M.I.A. sounds fucking pissed. “Matangi” is a little bit like a companion piece to “Bamboo Banga,” replete with an expanded list of her international auxiliaries and the same measure of muscular calm....
There’s no doubt that the synths on “Bucky Done Gun” sound like they’re being shot from an Ares Shirke 5.56 for a reason. Another on the list of M.I.A.’s great apologia, the track is her defense of freedom-fighting but made euphoric with conga and horn samples. It’s also the best example of Diplo’s often criticized ripping of favela dance music.
Who knew when M.I.A. crafted a hook about stick-up robbery that “Paper Planes” would ultimately be the cut that got her to, well, take all your money? Aligned with a strained sample of the Clash’s “Straight To Hell” and lackadaisical delivery, the song went from a fan favorite to beloved by people who have no interest in reading about Maya’s pencha...
M.I.A.’s use of vocal codas are sporadic, but when she does it, they sew themselves into your synapses and stay there forever. The “ya-ya-heyyyy” at the end of “Galang” is not only catchy and gorgeous, it fuses folk-chanting with club music. The quilts that M.I.A. constructs are Emma “If I Can’t Dance To It, It’s Not My Revolution” Goldman-pop, pol...
This is how you make a comeback anthem: When it seems like the entire world is out to get you, you slap them in the face with an ascendant trunk-rattler that boasts boisterous “damned-if-I-do” middle-fingers bars. Originally on her Vicki Leekx mixtape, the Danja-produced track showed more pop-polish than any of M.I.A.’s previous work but refrained ...
M.I.A. Singer/rapper who combined her Sri Lankan heritage and London upbringing to create a clever fusion of hip-hop, electro, dancehall, and grime. Read Full Biography. STREAM OR BUY: Active. 2000s - 2020s. Born. July 18, 1975 in London, England. Genre.
916K. Maya was born in Hounslow, London but spent little time there as, at only 6 months old, her parents moved the family back to their native Sri Lanka. Motivated by her fathers wish to support the Tamil efforts to win independence from the majority Sinhalese population, her father became politically known as Arular and was a founder member ...
Mar 27, 2018 · Tuesday 27 March, 2018. Text by Daniel Dylan Wray. On fame & freedom — The rapper discusses fame, high-profile feuding, and MATANGI / MAYA / M.I.A – a new, years-in-the-making documentary about her life. ‘I hate it,’ she tells writer Daniel Dylan Wray. “It’s like housewives of Copenhagen up in here,” jokes Maya Arulpragasam ...
CTRL is a song performed by M.I.A.. It is written by M.I.A. and co-produced with Fern and Cadenza. The track was released for streaming through OHMNI.COM on September 9, 2020, and it is unknown if it belongs to a longer project or is a standalone single. "Production-wise, “CTRL” strikes me as a trap-era update on Kala, matching skittering ...
