M.I.A.’s had plenty of time to stare in the time since her last album, 2010’s messy Maya - and not by her decision. It takes more courage to peer into that chasm, I think, than it does to fire off any angry tweets to Anderson Cooper. She’s been mapping our collective, post-internet rat brain for over a decade now, rebuilding it with a globally-inspired bricolage that knows no equal. And while critics are quick to dismiss her controversies as run-of-the-mill ploys for attention (and sales), dressed up in pretentious aesthetic exceptionalism, I’m pretty sure she’s the one who’s got us figured out. “I have become a fan of M.I.A.,” Assange explained, “because I think she is the most courageous woman working in western music, without exception.” Flipping the bird at the Superbowl half-show with a shrug, spouting caustic clairvoyance of a Google “connected to the government,” flashing her contradictions like jewelry (oh, these truffle fries?), Mathangi “Maya” Arulpragasam certainly isn’t boring. kicked off her latest tour with a little help from Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, who Skyped in from the Ecuadorian embassy in London (his home in exile for the last 16 months) to inform a sold-out crowd at New York’s Terminal 5 that he’s a fan.
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