Before I had even heard one track from Santogold I knew that her music somehow resembled M.I.A. Or so I was told…
For every article that hyped the Lower East Side Artiste’s merits there was another linking her erroneously to M.I.A. Some would call it convenience. I would call it lazy journalism.
The music of Santi White and Mathangi “Maya” Arulpragasam are vastly different and perhaps the artists share more in their strong personas then in their music. That’s not to say they don’t have some similarities though. The point at which they intersect sonically is best summed up by this all-star collaboration with Radioclit helming production duties.
In conventional pop songs cheesy sexual innuendo is squeezed out of seemingly innocuous lyrics (look to any song on commercial radio for further evidence of this). In the wonderfully warped world of M.I.A and Santogold sexual come ons such as “Get It Up” become pseudo political denouncements of apathy. Very clever.
PS. Is M.I.A still retired?
Title Image by Christopher Polk via Getty
