I've been thinking a lot about MIA lately (and no, not just because she's really attractive). Maybe it was rewatching Slumdog Millionaire recently (for which she co-wrote an Academy Award nominated song), or maybe it was the absurd and copious media coverage that she's been receiving on Pitchfork. Maybe it was the sensationalistic NY Times exposee that was published about her, an article so incendiary that it angered Maya to the point of posting the journalist's phone number on Twitter as her own and telling fans "ll b taking calls all day bitches ;)" Regardless, I felt compelled to write about her, and what better way than a review of her new album, / \ / \ / \ Y / \?
Before diving into all the (inevitable) politics and controversy surrounding her, let's focus on the actual music of the album first; in terms of sonics, this is about as far away from "Kala" as MIA could've gone. / \ / \ / \ Y / \ sounds angry, dark, mindlessly bold, unpolished and industrial, sometimes simultaneously (for better or for worse). With the exception of the guilty-pleasure "XXXO" (of which there is a killer remix with Jay-Z floating around on the internet) and the Diplo-produced "Tell Me Why," there isn't a whole lot of pop on this record.
Instead, much of it wallows in its dusty, digital sounding productions and tries its damnedest to sound dark and dangerous (apparently, much of the album was recorded with up-and-coming dubstep producer Rusko). "Steppin Up" sounds like Skinny Puppy if they drank Robotussin and then decided to record crunk music (I'm not the first to make comparisons between this album and Skinny Puppy; see Diplo's twitter post). Here is a prime example of this, the already-notorious, momentarily-banned-from-YouTube, rediculous, NSFW video for "Born Free," a song that samples 1970's electro-punk pioneers Suicide:
While I am probably one of the few MIA fans to actually appreciate the crunchy, snarled electro-throb of "Born Free," I cannot help but feel that MIA's political statements often feel flat, obvious and designed to generate publicity, and this video is no exception. Too frequently, MIA's convoluted politics seem to be more more important to her than good song-writing. I can't help but agree with Diplo (MIA's former boyfriend and producer of her 2008 megahit "Paper Planes") when he said, "In the end, Maya is postmodern: she can’t really make music or art that well, but she’s better than anyone at putting crazy ideas into motion. She knows how to manipulate, how to withhold, how to get what she wants." Underneath it all, I guess / \ / \ / \ Y / \ really isn't too different from Kala: a couple of excellent bangers, and a lot of filler.
*Note: you can stream the album here*
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