M.I.A., the stage moniker of Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam, has dropped a new song, "Borders." The hard-hitting politically-charged banger takes on border politics, police brutality and privilege. The singer-songwriter and rapper teased the new release via Twitter earlier this week, promising the new material was due out soon, so today's new track from her forthcoming Matahdatah album is a pleasant surprise.
— M.I.A (@MIAuniverse) November 19, 2015
As Pitchfork reports, the new track was streaming on Spotify earlier this morning but has since been removed. However, you can listen to it via Audiomack, here. The British-Sri Lankan artist is working on her upcoming LP, Matahdatah. Over the summer, she released an audiovisual project called "Matahdatah Scroll 01 Broader Than a Border." The six-minute short film-of-sorts features the artist's new-ish song, "Swords," as well as "Warriors" from Matangi. It was filmed in India and West Africa and highlights different types of dance in these regions juxtaposed with clips of M.I.A. lighting an oversized Om symbol outside an Indian temple. The video is just the first in a whole series of D.I.Y. audiovisual releases leading up to the full Matahdatah album. Watch the "Matahdatah Scroll 01 Broader Than a Border" video below. As Billboard reports, she discussed the project with Entertainment Weekly earlier this year, saying "it's like a journal. And the journal happens to be a really wide journey. It's about borders and it's kind of testing the human idea of that - whether it's physical borders, geographical or philosophical ones." Earlier this week, the artist tweeted about how difficult it is to say something new about the world through her politically-charged lens when the world hasn't changed at all and she's already expressed her feelings throughout the past decade of her career. Ten years ago, she dropped her groundbreaking debut album, Arular, and has since been consistently pumping out her signature fusion of electronic dance hip-hop with world music undertones always juxtaposed with political lyrics. Luckily she still has the drive to create, and in usual M.I.A. fashion the new track is as simultaneously political and danceable as ever.
The world I talked about ten years ago is still the same. that's why it's hard for me to say it again on a newLP. can u just play the old1. — M.I.A (@MIAuniverse) November 18, 2015
