Album Reviews

Kala | M.I.A.

By Nirav ⋅ July 29, 2008 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

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I wanted to be more like you (Dan) and post about obscure groups. And the first name that popped into my head was a South Asian hip hop artist named M.I.A.. When you first here her tracks, you have to think “what they hell is this, its so random!”. And then you get over that feeling and start appreciating all the sounds, the union of the sounds to make something whole, and the hypnotizing yet powerful lyrics.

Kala (2007) is M.I.A.’s second album and was released almost a year ago from today. It was originally meant to be produced here in the U.S. by Timbaland and his studios but due to Visa problems, it couldn’t be done. So M.I.A. got creative and started finding her own production people by visiting several countries in Africa, India, and Sri Lanka to come up with the sound. When you hear the album, you’ll think some of the beats were recorded literally on the streets of these countries!

But that makes the production style not only unique, but also very whole. M.I.A. got to know the people and the culture of each country before she had their people produce a track. She visited local town producers as well as the country’s elite (ie. A.R. Rahman from India) to find beats. And though each track sounds very different from the one prior to it, it still gives you a feeling of completeness and cultural quality that you wouldn’t expect. She’s not like Ludacris where she just went to get one track and make a music video that slightly exploits the country nor is she a huge pop celebrity like Madonna or Celine Dion who can woo the country’s best but only put out surface level lyrics. She respects the true culture and takes her time with the people, sometimes spending over 2~3 months over a track (full album took a year and a half to complete).

More importantly than than the beats of course are her lyrics and ways of singing them. She has a unique singing voice that is still rhythmical but not fully “singing” and “rapping”. It’s kinda a weird mix but comes out really cool. Probably a very bad description, but you’ll get it once you hear her voice! Her lyrics on the other hand are very conscious, focusing on cultural attributes of our current life instead of just political and top level. Here’s a sample that will get right into it from her track Come Around ft. Timbaland:

In a faraway land we got shit made
Ray-Ban shades, warheads laid
Babies born in air raids
My girls run the Everglades
Indian tribesmen gamble spades
Indian chicks, they get men laid
Milk and honey, smoke high-grade
Gold and diamond, gems and jade
Ride up on our tanks, invade
Blow up thing to save our name
Mina, Rina, Tina, Sabrina
Being a super Indian babe
We black market, we black made
We hit shit out when it rains
Would you come down and catch my train?
Would you run down and play this game?

Tags: hip hop