M.I.A. comin' back with power, power—with Kala!

The first time we saw and heard M.I.A. was on the now defunct MTV program Subterranean in March of '05. At first, we were more intrigued then impressed.

As popular music artists go, her background is fairly unique.

The daughter of a Tamil militant, M.I.A. (real name, Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam) spent the first part of her life on the move. At 6 months, her family left London for Sri Lanka. As her father became more political and then militant in supporting the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), M.I.A. and her family moved to India, then back to Sri Lanka, then moved again to India on their way back to London where she and her family were processed and housed as refugees.

With those kind of experiences in her past, especially during the impressionable years, it's no wonder where the political and social economic topics come from in the music of M.I.A.

Obviously, M.I.A. is not the first artist to expose sensitive topics through lyrics. However, her presentation and final product is nothing like we've seen before.

With her first proper release Arular in 2005, M.I.A. broke into the mainstream/alternative music scene with decent backing from Beggars Banquet's XL Recordings. Already established within the club circuit, M.I.A. reached commercial success status within weeks of her debut release. The album was a hit on an international scale and M.I.A. found herself on the Mercury Music Prize shortlist, opening for Gwen Stefani, making several American television appearances and on "Best of 2005" lists everywhere.

This past August, M.I.A. has reemerged. Her throat grabbing sophomore release, Kala, starts off with three tracks that grab you and just won't let go.

Bamboo Banga is a smooth track that sneaks up on you. It builds into an announcement for all listeners with the repeating lines, "I'm big timer, it's a Bamboo Banga" and, "M.I.A. comin' back with power!" over a solidifying beat and a Bollywood music sample. If there was any doubt about her ability to deliver, M.I.A. answers the critics nicely.

If you have the bass up and volume at full, be prepared. Bird Flu starts and sustains a level of tribal beat and ear candy that will have you hitting repeat as soon as its over. You're going to flip for her intertwining of rhythm, chant and samples of the "caws" of birds. It's freakishly intoxicating.

The last of this opening trifecta is Boyz. It's layer over layer of catchy sounds and beats highly influenced from her time in Sri Lanka and the sounds of Afro-Jamaician culture.

There are 9 other tracks on this album including one with an appearance from rapper Timbaland. Some of stand out tracks are: Jimmy (the second single and cover of "Jimmy Jimmy Aaja" from the Bollywood film Disco Dancer), Hussel, $20, XR2 (a song with similar elements to Arular's Bucky Done Gun in parts) and Paper Planes (which has the best use of gun and cash register samples to date).

Kala is one of those albums that can cross genre's and borders with ease. If you like rap—you'll like it (for the record, we aren't rap fans at The BGLC but we do love this album). If you like electronic, drum and bass or dancehall—we're preaching to the choir on this. International listeners will like it for it's world music bounty of flavors. Whether you are in these groups or not, if you give this album an honest listen, you'll be smitten as well.

Again, this isn't an average purchase for The BGLC, but without a doubt it's earned a spot on our "Top 10 Albums of 2007".