What everyone's talking about:
Well, M.I.A., aka Maya Arulpragasam, is pretty much a media-darling at this point. She's been on the cover of Fader, had a UK single reviewed in the New York Times, and an article in the New Yorker, and will be in a dozen or more magazines in the next month or few. I don't think I've been to a single party (that was any good I mean) since this summer where they didn't play either "Sunshowers" or "Galang" (both genuinely awesome tracks) - and she's all over this here interweb-thingy as a blogger favorite, and there's a few damn good reasons for this.
Not only does Maya rap some seriously vicious lines - she's as grimey as any of the other female stars of the UK scene - but she can really sing, and add to this the beats over which she layers her lovely/nasty voice are seriously the hotnesss - this track in particular is all fire and bombast, merging huge analog bass and electro beats with her voice to devastating effect.
One of the things the media has commented on is Maya's childhood and upbringing - she's Sri Lanka-born, and fled the country with her family as a war-refugee when the Sinhala-Tamil conflict happened in the mid-80s, relocating to a Mitcham UK housing estate (that's the UK-version of the Projects). She has tried her hand at the visual arts - stencils and mixed media paintings mostly - and she was nominated for an Alternative Turner Prize in 2001.
Right now, she is on a world-tour, with proceeds going to the Tsunami-relief effort, as Sri Lanka was one of the hardest-hit countries. A lot of Maya's personal politics come through in her songs, with a lot of them about sexual abuse, the world's poor, teenage prostitution, sweatshop labor, kidnapping, war, etc. That's what I would call "Heavy Shit" for such damn dance-able music, right?
I don't know just how big M.I.A. will be, or where her music will be in a few years, but right now, she's in the spotlight and she deserves it. Her album, Arular comes out on XL Recordings on the 22nd of this month, and I very-highly reccomend you pick it up becase its a solid listen that will make you think, but its also one you can dance to. That doesn't happen that often.
Fire Fire!