M.I.A., “Bring the Noize”

If you’ve been following the reactions to Kanye West’s leaked Yeezus the past few days, you may have seen a few comparisons to M.I.A.’s 2010 album, MAYA. That release was really the last we’d heard from the British-Tamil artist, aside from the 2012 one-off “Bad Girls” and, of course, “Trufflegate.” And now, like clockwork: “Bring the Noize” is her latest single, off a new LP, Matangi, due in the fall. (Maybe I’m exhausted from too much Yeezus consumption, but a couple listens in my main takeaway is that I like that the emphasis has her saying, “bring the noize when we run upon them” instead of “up on them.”)

Via Pitchfork, M.I.A. also provided BBC’s Zane Lowe with some insight into her delayed output: “It’s not easy, it’s not easy,” she said, of sending new music to her label. “It’s not easy. I keep finishing the record and handing it in, finishing the record and handing it in.” She continued,

It’s just one of those things where I’ve given up at this point. I was literally going to start… putting out records from my bedroom. This was my last stab at it — I’m going to hand it in and wait for it to go out the way albums go out. If I didn’t get it out right now, I would’ve definitely exploded.

So we’ll take the noize as we can get it.