[title size=”1 to 6″ style=”options: default, sidebar”]Letter Grade: C+[/title]

The first time I listened to M.I.A’s new album, Matangi, I hated it. I thought it was boring and it gave me a headache. I was going to write a really negative review. But after I listened to it a second time, I liked it a lot more. Though it is repetitive, some of the songs drag on, and M.I.A’s voice gets honestly kind of annoying after a while, I enjoyed the album.

Matangi has a lot of interesting elements. M.I.A’s sound is completely unique but new album is not to be taken seriously and lacks any sort of political message. In “Exodus,” she states “My blood type is / no negative.” This line expresses the general mood of the album. Though she mentions different countries (in “Matangi” she lists 39 different countries), for the most part Matangi is completely apolitical.

Many of the songs from Matangi are more pop than “world music.” Though she includes elements from many world music traditions, the lyrics of the songs are almost all pop. The best example of this is “Come Walk With Me,” the fifth track of the album. This song, in which M.I.A displays a Cyndi Lauper-esce vocal quality, is a typical girl-meets-boy song. “You ain’t gotta shake it / just be with me,” she sings.

“Bad Girls” (a single released in January 2012) is at the midpoint of the album. It’s a girl-power anthem, and its sound is energetic and exotic. In “Y.A.L.A,” M.I.A. pokes fun at people who use YOLO as a philosophy. She states, “Back home where I come from we keep being born again and again and again.” M.I.A encourages her listeners to have a more international sensibility.

M.I.A’s album is less political than her other work, but it is still a good time. Though I struggle listening to the album in its entirety (it does get repetitive after a few songs) and hated it the first time I heard it, on a second listen, I do like it. It’s high energy. It’s engaging. It’s different. And it’s worth a listen.