M.I.A. - Born Free

You can also watch it here,
http://miauk.com/
or here,
http://vimeo.com/11219730?hd=1
***Contains some nudity and violence

This is one of the best music videos I have ever seen. It features police that look like US SWAT violently breaking into apartments looking for someone and some intense music. Initially, Universal Music Group pulled the video from YouTube, but after some shaming by M.I.A. and other groups, the video has been put back up. Watch it, all the way through.

M.I.A. is the most important musician in the world. Her music is fuel for revolution.

M.I.A. is Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam, the daughter of Tamil Tigers and a refugee from the Sri Lankan conflict. She grew up in London studying art and slowly made the move to music. After touring with Elastica and Peaches and even directing a music video for Elastica, M.I.A. recorded a 6-song tape with a 4-track, an MC-505, and a mic. One song on the tape, Galang got a couple remixes and eventually being a world underground club hit.

The song Paper Planes off of the second album Kala is what made M.I.A. an international sensation. The song is a mix of genres with a strong political message about life in the third world and immigration into the first world. In the last years of the 00s, you couldn't watch a movie with a socio-political message without hearing Paper Planes. You have heard it even if you don't know you have heard it.

I say that M.I.A. is the most important musician in the world because her appeal spans rap, electronic, dance, indie, and even mainstream pop. You can hear her all across the globe, in the richest and the poorest areas in the world. Her music is not about heartbreak and love or sex and drugs, its about war, violence, domination, and most important, struggle for freedom.