Not too long ago, the British-Sri Lankan artist represented the future of music, with innovative productions and groundbreaking political messages. Today, her music has taken a backseat to the headlines she generates
In December 2004, a mixtape titled Piracy Funds Terrorism introduced vocalist M.I.A. and producer Diplo to the world. Although it was an unofficial recording, with thousands of copies pressed on CD and distributed at concerts or over the internet, many publications ended up including it on their best-of lists of that year. The album was an exuberant dance party that included vocal tracks by M.I.A. over (unauthorized) samples of songs by Madonna, Prince, the Bangles, Jay-Z, and Kraftwerk, among others. Where had it all come from?
In reality, Mathangi “Maya” Arulpragasam (London, 1975) had never thought of dedicating herself to music. Her family came from Sri Lanka and belonged to the Tamil ethnic group, persecuted by the government of that country. Her father, who took the nom de guerre Arular, was a leader of the Tamil Tiger guerrilla group, who took up arms seeking independence. But he was also an absent parent while Maya and her mother lived as refugees in the London neighborhood of Acton, in an environment that the artist remembers as “incredibly racist.” Her mother got a job as a seamstress for the Royal Family, and Maya earned a place at the prestigious Central Saint Martins school, where she trained as a visual artist, filmmaker, and fashion designer. At that time, Maya was trying to make social films and began to exhibit her pictorial work (collages influenced by graffiti, Tamil culture, pop art and a strong political tone) under the pseudonym M.I.A. She was even nominated for the alternative Turner Prize and the actor Jude Law was one of the first buyers of her art.
But her course changed when she befriended Justine Frischmann of Elastica, who persuaded her to design the cover art for the band’s album The Menace and film a documentary about her 2001 North American tour. The opening act for those shows was electro-lash singer Peaches, who taught M.I.A. how to use the Roland MC-505 synthesizer and encouraged her to make music. A couple of years later she recorded her first track, Galang, on a limited edition of 500 vinyl singles on a small independent label, Showbiz Records, which was later followed by another single, Sunshowers. Word began to spread on small radio stations, in some underground clubs, and, above all, through file-sharing on the internet. In 2004, she posted several songs on her Myspace page, record labels went after her and she ended up signing with the prestigious label XL Recordings to release her first album, Arular.