English-Sri Lankan singer/rapper M.I.A is coming to the end of her star-studded career with a new album entitled AIM which she recently announced will be her last. She has strung some of the biggest hits such as Paper Planes over the years and is renowned for possessing a slightly out of tune voice, which ironically helps her sound distinct and compliment the productions in her material inEnglish-Sri Lankan singer/rapper M.I.A is coming to the end of her star-studded career with a new album entitled AIM which she recently announced will be her last. She has strung some of the biggest hits such as Paper Planes over the years and is renowned for possessing a slightly out of tune voice, which ironically helps her sound distinct and compliment the productions in her material in a different way. Due to the occasion and predictable electronic theme of her material, I decided to roll through the record to see if it was a good send-off.
The record features impressive, witty lyricism on a number of tracks like Borders and Foreign Friend. A good take on the tensions that have dramatically risen over the past few years regarding immigration and cultural clashes.
The best tracks on the entire record for me are unquestionably Go Off and A.M.P. Skrillex had a hand in the production of both songs and his influence proves invaluable. The relentless intensity of the drums galvanises M.I.A.'s emphatic rapping and singing deliveries in a sharp, thrilling way. The extremely prominent autotune on Go Off works wonders and weave together the instrumentation like a web. For me it is clear that this type of production is far more catered to her strengths as her imperfections in her vocals really give the instrumentation life and more purpose.
That's about it when it comes to the positives to take away from this album.
Freedun, although lyrically sound, is a minute too long in length. There is absolutely no need for the same instrumentation to repeat over and over until it becomes a bore and something to skip through. The long drab, lazy, purposeless outro along with M.I.A.'s desolate, insignificant vocal snippets and chops unfortunately becomes a concurrent theme. Bird Song suffers from the same problem; the percussive synthesis on the cut is pretty good and I do like her vocal delivery but yet again it gradually becomes soulless, bland after becoming insanely repetitive from the two minute mark. If her lyricism or vocal delivery isn't going to pick up, the instrumentation should and that never really happens enough on the record to leave me satisfied.
But there are tracks here that are less than satisfying. Or to put it better, the tracks that are quite frankly terrible. Jump In is basically equivalent to absolute garbage. Worst track on the whole record. It makes me furious and disappointed when I hear how weak and uninspiring M.I.A.'s vocals are - unfortunately continually panning and chopping them isn't going to save the overall track from being painfully bland and tasteless. This is one of those songs that desperately need instrumentation to survive. Survivor is also vomit, her voice does not in any shape or form cohere with the intergalactic themed instrumentation and it just made me cringe hearing her harrowingly sing "survivor" sloppily as the washy synthesized pads produced a completely different vibe. Ali R U OK? features more of her Southern Asian influences in regards to the instrumentation but yet again that does not save it from grace due to the obnoxiously cringy, constant "eh" spluttered across the track, which yet again is matched with very repetitive instrumentation from start to end.
The rest of the tracks I feel indifferent to and think nothing of them.
A good handful of these tracks would have better if they were shorter by a full minute. They were that bad. Execution is vital to allow lyricism to jab through and in too many instances did that below par element affect the other medium. The album is very unfocused. She doesn't sound half as good as she did perhaps ten years ago, and neither does the production in her material.
Such a shame that her last album is generally sour and directionless, but the album isn't purely horrible. Apart from Go Off, A.M.P. and perhaps Bird Song, there's nothing unique or amazing regarding the production. This is a bad album.
I will be listening to her older material from now on.… Expand
AIMYour Score0 out of 10User Score
