elllipsis
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Posts posted by elllipsis
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Did you guys read this?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-24671871
Pretty interesting interview. My fave parts:
She became preoccupied with death and reincarnation, fixating on the Tamil people who lost their lives in Sri Lanka's 25-year war, where her father had been a key agitator (and, later, a mediator).
"I started thinking 'what happens when they die?'" she says.
"And I thought, 'well, they must reincarnate, because they're Hindus, which is great news for them. But the battle is whether they're going to come back angry or pissed off, because of their lives being cut short."
"It was a random thought," she adds. "None of my friends were interested in having this conversation. It's just stuff I would think about when I was in the bath."
Looking back, MIA realises she was trying to make sense of the upheaval in her life. "I had to change and move and embrace new things," she says.
And, eventually, she managed it: Not in the bath - but on Google.
She was in India creating new artwork, when she typed in "green" and the word Matangi popped up. The singer's first name is Mathangi (with an extra "h") so, naturally, she clicked the link.
What she discovered was a 5,000-year-old Hindu goddess, with four arms and green skin. Often pictured on a throne, playing sitar, Mantangi governs speech, music, knowledge and the arts.
The more MIA searched, the more affinity she felt with her ancient namesake.
"Her mantra was MIA backwards, her mudra [ritual gesture] was the middle finger, and she was versed in 64 arts called the Kala, which is my mum's name," she says. "It was really exciting."
The discovery amounted to a spiritual awakening, and it gave the singer a renewed sense of her place in the world.
"It was something I needed to find," she says. "Some sort of confirmation."
one song, Attention, was recorded standing in the rain on the Caribbean island of Bequia.
"If you isolate the vocals, it's got everything in it - the crickets and the animals and the birds," she says.
she protests that if you freeze-frame "the precise moment in question" there are 10 to 15 cheerleaders behind her, all of them under 16.
"They're all wearing cheerleader outfits, hips thrusted in the air, legs wide open, in this very sexually provocative position," she says.
"Is my finger offensive, or is the underage black girl with her legs wide open more offensive to the family audience?
Unlike Cyrus, MIA has always seemed in total control of her image and her femininity. Even when she performed in a see-through dress at the 2009 Grammys, it was to show off her pregnancy bump.
Has she ever come under pressure to dress provocatively?
"No!" she cackles. "If anything, my record label used to complain that I wore make-up!
"When I first started, they'd say, 'well, if you're so opinionated about this, this and this, why do you wear make up and have lairy clothes on? Shouldn't you dress more like a dude?'.
"That's offensive in itself. I don't have to look crusty to say I care about things. And besides, a human being's a bit more complex than that."
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she just posted a still from what I presume to be the NTMT music video
sooo glad that song is getting a video!
best in the album imo. that shoegaze-y wall of sound -
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it means cunt too, doesn't it?
Yeah, it's probably even more 'cunt' than 'pussy'. From what I understood it's basically the worst, most offensive way to say 'vagina' in Japanese.
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My favourites are Night Time, My Time, Nobody Asked Me (If I Was Okay), Omanko & Love In Stereo.
Least favourite is probably I Blame Myself - which isn't very surprising since I was never a fan of her earlier poppier stuff.
Omanko: So I googled the song title a few days ago because I was curious-- thought it was some obscure American city name but turns out it's a Japanese swear word "The only unmentionable word in japanese media and public speech." How interesting.
Apparently it means 'pussy'.
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Nobody Asked Me (If I Was Okay) is grungy perfection.
edit - listening to Omanko now. It's really good imo, kinda reminds me of Suicide and feels so, idk, dirty.
also, lmao @ myself going to the 'omanko' tumblr tag in hopes of finding the lyrics 
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Kinda embarrassingly, Off To The Races.
It was easily my least favourite from BTD during the first few listens, and now it's one of my favourite Lana songs & I'd do lots of questionable stuff to get my hands on the demo...Also, and while I never disliked it, it did take me a while until I finally 'got' the brilliance and magic of Yayo (AKA version, of course).
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OMG Antonia
And aww @@Philomene & @, you guys are too sweet!
I voted @ because he's always so chill and super funny
and HOT and he'll show us his wee-wee
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Very popular, plays in mainstream radio all the time. Anyone who pays the least bit of attention to music knows who she is.
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“Without Lou Reed, we wouldn’t have punk rock. We wouldn’t have The Sex Pistols, Black Flag, The Clash, Television, Dead Kennedys, or Devo.
Without punk rock, we wouldn’t have post-punk. We wouldn’t have Joy Division, The Cure, The Smiths, This Heat, Talking Heads, Wire, Gang of Four, Nick Cave, The Feelies, or Swans.
Without post-punk, we wouldn’t have alternative rock as it is today. We wouldn’t have Pixies, Radiohead, Nirvana, Pavement, R.E.M, The Replacements, Nine Inch Nails, Cocteau Twins, or Weezer.
Without alternative rock, you wouldn’t have most indie rock as it is today. You wouldn’t have Modest Mouse, Built to Spill, Pavement, The Strokes, Yo La Tengo, The Dismemberment Plan, Arctic Monkeys, Interpol, Deerhunter, or TV on the Radio.
Without Lou Reed, we wouldn’t have noise rock. We wouldn’t have Sonic Youth, Big Black, The Jesus Lizard, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Fugazi, Boris, or Dinosaur Jr.
Without noise rock, we wouldn’t have shoegaze. We wouldn’t have My Bloody Valentine, Ride, Slowdive, Galaxie 500, Flying Saucer Attack, or Have a Nice Life.
This is the legacy Lou left behind.”
Perfectly put. R.I.P.
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btw, i've also read that jim morrison was an infp which i think is pretty weird because he's so different from both me and kurt so either he's been mistyped by a lot of people on the internet or he was just some different kind of infp.
I think in Morrison's case it's also pretty difficult to know how much of his apparent personality was drug-fuelled since he was pretty much high on something 24/7...
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The thing that contradicts my observation is her Ride Or Die relation with Barrie. I guess Barrie is a really cool and understanding person.
Her seemingly very normal and healthy relationship with Barrie - as opposed to all the danger, darkness and obsession she seems to be fascinated with in all the men / relationships she mentions in her songs - is one of the things that makes me wonder how much of her public personality is actually her and makes me doubt a lot of her 'bad girl' backstory. I often get the feeling that she uses these artistic personas she's always created one way or another as a safe way to experiment and live (in her mind & via song) all these dark and dangerous fantasies that fascinate her without actually having to live them and deal with the less glamorous sides of it. I don't know if this makes any sense.
(Btw, this has nothing to do with the authenticity debate - which I personally think is complete bullshit.)
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I can't at the people who say Pepsi is better than Coke
Seriously.
btw, Coke Zero & Vanilla Coke >>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Mountain Dew is hard to find here, and Diet Mountain Dew even more so. I found the regular kind in London though and tried it - because of Lana, yeah. Didn't really like it.
I live for coffee & tea though.
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this interview is probably the most informational one she's ever given but it's also kinda...off-putting in a way. not like that one where she says barrie and her are the only true artists left and all that stuff but it kind of shows how...shallow she is.
One or two dumb comments aside (the 'dead friends' one really is something else...
), I actually liked this interview. I thought that for once she wasn't trying too hard to sound intellectual and subsequently saying a lot of half-baked stuff; she's clearly mostly influenced / inspired by visuals (which imo makes a lot of sense since one of the best things about her music is the mood & vivid imagery she's able to convey) and that really shines through in this interview. I liked reading about all the little things tbh - the decor of her new house, the streamers & fish tank in the trailer, the decadent camps of Lake Placid, how she describes even her alcohol of choice as 'anything fast and dark', the drives to the beach, the ideas behind the National Anthem video... it's like she takes inspiration from these little things (idealising them quite a bit in the process) & creates a whole song / video around them. Idk, I enjoyed reading about that and much prefer this type of interview to the ones where she tries to sound like a deep thinker. -
she moved to London, where she crashed with Mawson for a few years.
Is that true though? Never heard anything about her living in London before thissss. #badfan
What visa was she on, even?
I don't know about the crashing at Ben Mawson's part, but she was definitely in England for a while. For instance, this interview was filmed at a recording studio there in 2010.
Depending on how long you stay you might not even need a visa to work in the UK.
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I just don't see how this "sounds like a soundtrack for the Breakfast Club playing in her head" or this "electropop hooks straight from the 80s" are bad things tbh.
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Loved Gulag Orkestar & The Flying Club Cup but was kinda disappointed when I saw them live in 2011 (at a festival, but still) and never even listened to The Rip Tide after that. But I'm getting all nostalgic now and might give them another chance soon.
This one's my favourite song:
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Washed Out
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M.I.A.
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The Guardian review. They gave it 4 stars out of 5.