Kala
|
List Price: Our Price: $7.49 You Save: $3.49 (32%) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $5.25 (click here) Category: Music CD See more new music releases 
|
|---|
Buy this Music CD at online store in your country
Canadian Music Store
Canadian Music Store
Free Music Notes for Kala
Free Music Review: Out of This World
Hit: 4 Stars
I love M.I.A. She experiments with music like a scientist does with lab rats. Crazy beats, untouchable energy I love it. Free Music Review: Weird, Wacky, Inventive - but not a Masterpiece
Hit: 3 Stars
All these glowing reviews for MIA would lead you to believe that this album is "all that". Well, its not. Its certainly groundbreaking in the same way that a TV show throws up a new story arc and you say "Hey, I've never seen THAT done before!", but the similarity ends there.
That said, this album does have its' moments. First of all, one must be in the right frame of mind to appreciate an album such as this. If youre a fan of simple pop or rock music, I wouldn't really advise this - you might actually get a headache (a couple of my friends I thought would really like it, ended up hating it and calling it a "collection of noises"). However, if you like experimental fusion music, Missy Elliot style beats, and a whole lot of synthesizer, then well, you're in luck.
Make no mistake, MIA is no great vocalist. In fact, her voice is the least interesting thing about her. As a rapper, she is average at best - her quaint English stylings lend the songs a certain something but the novelty of that wears off pretty quickly. What she does have, is excellent production, and shes probably invested in a team to specifically dig up old and obscure records to sample.
Prime example is "Jimmy", which was a track on the hit Bollywood film from the early 1980s "Disco Dancer". I downloaded the original track to compare the two versions, and the shocking thing is that MIA hasn't even bothered to tweak the song a little. In fact, the song is a note for note copy of the original, with MIA's vocals overlapping every now and then. Sure, every kid with a laptop these days could make a song like "Jimmy", but you have to hand it to MIA for doing it first.
"Boyz" is a fun number with Sri Lankan girl choruses. That theme and sentiment runs through the whole record. Verses start and stop - choruses that are supposed to appear don't, and musical interludes take a completely different direction on some songs - all in all, this is an unpredictable and fun record, but its best savored in small doses.
MIA is a novelty act, yes, but you can't deny that her songs sound good on hi-fi equipment. She should really thank her producers - they did a remarkable job getting her the best of everything, and this album, "Kala", is a winner because of that. Not a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination, but as a creative experiment, this was quite spectacular.
Three Stars.
Free Music Review: SHE DID IT AGAIN !
Hit: 5 Stars
M.I.A. gave us more world/techno/hip hop beats on her sophmore album and she doesn't dissapoint! I love listening to this while washing dishes it makes me dance. She is so refeshing, I love how shes not confined to one genre of music. Free Music Review: It takes a few listens to properly ingest...
Hit: 5 Stars
... but the time spent taking in this album is well worth it. 'Kala' is extraordinarily complex. It definitely takes a special talent to make something like this.
It helps to know what to expect. I agree with the notion that other Amazon users have put forward that this is a 'noisy mess'.. but that isn't always a bad thing, at least not in music (See: Velvet Underground's "Sister Ray").
M.I.A. has her album spattered with all sorts of weird sound effects... beeps, cars, ect... and you could be fooled to think that the CD was actually skipping sometimes on certain songs. Then you have songs like "Birdflu", which is an all-out attack of exotic drum rhythms. And it's all done with a unique sense of style.
It takes time to truly appreciate. And it's quite impressive.
Free Music Review: yup yup!
Hit: 5 Stars
This will polarize people... again. You seriously will either love this album or hate it. If you liked (loved?) Arular, you'll love this one - more new beats, quotes older songs the same way Massive Attack does (to wonderful effect) and continues with the outlook we all need to cultivate to stay vital in the world. Only other thing I could compare her to would be Manu Chao in the sense that there're so many different worldly things going on in her music... and otherwise.