M.I.A. Shouldn't Have Apologized
An excellent defense of M.I.A.’s middle finger and career in general by Sasha Frere-Jones in The New Yorker.
Including this notable zinger at Pitchfork and Lynn Hirschberg:
“She made two albums that received all the praise they deserved, and then a third album called “/\/\/\Y/\,” which received a deeply weird and negative review in Pitchfork (unless you think M.I.A. is here only to provide “bangers” and hasn’t already vaulted way past her “potential as a pop artist” many times) and, most damagingly, the worst profile ever written about a musician, in the New York Times Magazine. (The trend of letting people who know nothing about music profile musicians is as outdated as fretting about cursing. Quite rightly, nobody would ever let me profile an Al Qaeda member; somehow, though, pop music is such a culturally light topic that no background is needed to cover it.)”
