MIA – Arular (XL)
April 29th, 2005 by duck
After well over a year of waiting, XL have finally seen fit to release MIA’s “Arular”. Named for her father, a ex-Tamil Tiger terrorist/freedom fighter (depending on your point of view) and now a political writer, the LP has been the subject of much frenzied web chat the world over. Now it’s here, and it was well worth the wait.
The music itself is a heady mix of ragga and electro, although it has almost everything else bar the kitchen sink thrown in too. The album was produced by the artist herself, Richard X, Steve Mackey (ex-Pulp) and Diplo amongst others, which should give you the impression that the album has a poppy, trashy gloss on it, and rightly so. Over the bass heavy stuttering beats, Maya (her real name – MIA is for “Missing In Action”) delivers political rants in a truly unique drawling patois, which at times borders on the totally incomprehensible, and at others on the totally incendiary. Making a record with lyrics like “Like PLO, I no surrender” might seem a little ill advised in the current political climate, but realistically, it’s refreshing to hear a record that is so upfront about these issues. MIA’s vocal style doesn’t really lend itself to the dense examination of politics in the way that, say a hip hop MC would tackle the subject, instead reducing the politics to soundbites, often with an overtly sexual element (“10 Dollar” for example runs “What can I get for 10 dollar? …Anything you want”). Such lyrics are never without a double meaning however- 10 dollars really will buy you anything you want in parts of the devloping world, Indonesan Nike workers after all make just a quarter of that ten dollars for a day’s work.
“Arular” like many brilliant records evokes a strange world of it’s own creating, and despite being both poppy and danceable in many places, it subversively swipes at the establishment with some pretty heavyweight blows. As astutely pointed out by a poster on the Big Chill’s forum, MIA’s album will probably strongly polarise opinion, but I for one hope it’ll be the sound booming out of every car window this summer.
Duck
