MIA

correction 2 article: http://blogs.villagevoice.com/music/archives/2010/06/lynn_hirschberg_2.php

hate the hirschberg not the game. or something. she should get fired. she does this stuff too much. editing and mix and matching are two very different things.

mixing and matching quotes anyway.

collage culture

and she ordered the food! entrapment via truffle fries.

I think it's safe to say that MIA has won this round.

bet stephen glass is wondering if people just didn't like his face

I think it's safe to say that MIA has won this round.

in a highly entertaining way too

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Let's hope the album itself can cause as much fuss and passionate discussion as this.

MIA's rep may be better than hirschberg's, but this article probably still did plenty to negatively affect the CW on her.

Not that a backlash wasn't already imminent, but this was probably the biggest platform to slam her yet.

MIA's rep may be better than hirschberg's

^I dont know if this is the case. On my scale, taking some liberties with journalistic license is nowhere near as bad as the juvenile romanticizing of terrorists, lying and basically making a complete ass of yourself.

you have weird standards Bill, esp in a case like this where the former is complicit in the construction of the latter

like, at least partly the reason you think MIA indulges in "juvenile romanticizing of terrorists, lying and basically making a complete ass of yourself" is because of Hirschberg "taking some liberties with journalistic license". would think this is self-evident.

except hirschberg is a journalist whereas mia is not a politician xp

"MIA's rep may be better than hirschberg's, but this article probably still did plenty to negatively affect the CW on her"

Really? I think the article basically appealed to people like Bill who've already made up their minds about what kind of person they think MIA is.

it can be a really difficult and delicate science to arrange quotes from an interview into a coherent statement that works on paper (that goes for the hiccups and subtleties of IRL conversation with anyone, not just someone like M.I.A. who can be, well, kind of incoherent). ultimately you almost HAVE to jumble the order of what was said, but you should still use endquotes and ellipses and such to denote where you're omitting or rearranging stuff. i get the feeling that bigger publications are almost more likely to play fast and loose with that stuff, though, especially when it comes time to find a concise pullquote or headline.

the ppl who buy her records -- myself included -- will care much more about the music than all this noise, tbh

u rly "buy" "records"?

yeah dogg

I cant imagine that's the case. Just cuz she didnt order the goddamn truffle fries doesntthe rest of the article doesnt contain some truth about MIA's character.

xxpost to Collier

at a record store O_O sometimes

mia's been saying retarded shit for abt 5 years now

nyt has to include corrections so u think the rest of it is true (hat tip to whoever came up with this gag)

ppl cut & paste quotes all the time, and most don't use ellipses or square brackets. you just have to do it in good faith.

I think the article basically appealed to people like Bill who've already made up their minds about what kind of person they think MIA is.

^ no, quite frankly, i never really gave a shit before, and will continue not to give a shit now. The article discusses visa problems, let's hope she continues to have them.

Wary about music/press-surrounding-the music fight but sometimes I feel her music wouldn't hit the way it does, if she wasn't this way as a person. Pop music is about the whole package.

The article discusses visa problems, let's hope she continues to have them.

You certainly sound like someone who doesn't give a shit either way. She may be full of shit but she has some of the lamest haters of any artist I can think of.

there are better ways of not giving a shit about something than getting in arguments on msg boards about that something

xpost hah supposedly visa problems inspired the enduring single Paper Planes. I agree, in a way.

mia has dumm opinions? god she should totally have her passport shredded

Bill has said what, 5 things on this thread? (Granted most of them were really stupid but that's as unsurprising as M.I.A. saying stupid stuff about terrorism.)

the ppl who buy her records -- myself included -- will care much more about the music than all this noise, tbh

true (and the article's biggest fans are obviously people who wanted MIA to suffer a hatchet job), but if she comes out with something that doesn't immediately grab the audience, people would be more apt to give it the benefit of the doubt if her rep is of forward-thinking, politically-minded dance floor genius than pretentious rich dipshit who stumbled into the good graces of Diplo and some record company dudes. and this is easily the highest profile interview she's given.

M.I.A. should come out with a solo voice + acoustic guitar album in 2015. Protest songs!

"^ no, quite frankly, i never really gave a shit before, and will continue not to give a shit now."

Right-o.

she loves madonna so dumbness definitely comes with that territory. (i love madonna and her dumbness.) don't know if this is more entertaining than hanky spanky sex book shocker or whatever. kinda less entertaining, really. how many people who dig MIA even know what the hell she is going on about in her songs? probably not many. tubthumping great for jello shot nite at the pub, etc.

xpost very true, if the new album is disappointing, the haters' voices will ring loudly.

forward-thinking, politically-minded dance floor genius than pretentious rich dipshit who stumbled into the good graces of Diplo and some record company dudes

If this article was successful at anything, it was in portraying her as both; this seems like an entirely false binary to me. Yes, it went to great pains to point out her shortcomings as a musician (which let's be honest, anyone who's ever seen a clip of her performing live was already aware that she is tone-deaf and arhythmical) but also pointed out her ability to edit, exploit synergy and mold the talents of others to her artistic vision. There's very little doubt in my mind that she is driving her collaborations after reading that article, particularly since it went so far out of its way to paint her as a controlling ogre.

She may be full of shit but she has some of the lamest haters of any artist I can think of.

http://www.alexross.com/slamdunk.jpg

i think you're giving it a more nuanced, generous reading than those not predisposed to like her, Dan. I'm sure Hirschberg painted Courtney Love as quite the driven lady, too.

how many people who dig MIA even know what the hell she is going on about in her songs?

yeah i don't jam that shit for the (usually rubbish) lyrics

Lyrics take em or leave em, but I will always maintain she is a great *vocalist*, as well.

xpost also if the new album is less "galang again" and more Flowers Of Romance, people aren't going to give her points for using collaborators well, but rip on the dipshit side of things.

Pseudo-multi-part-harmonies, rapping, speak singing, dancehall toasting, dream-pop cooing and more. She's probably improved even more on this new record.

"people aren't going to give her points for using collaborators well, but rip on the dipshit side of things"

I think "people" are probably just going to rip on the album, but whatever.

If you're writing a feature, your subject's rambling answers are always going to need curtailing or embellishing, but what's inexcusable for Hirschberg is that she trimmed the quotes to fit an agenda.

tubthumping great for jello shot nite at the pub

lol

Like suzy and s1ocki say, writers (myself included) play fast and loose with the order of quotes all the time. If someone says interesting things about subject x at three different points during an hour, then I'll compress them into one punchy composite quote. The point is not to change the meaning. Hirschberg's been caught out deliberately making her subject appear crass, self-important and pretentious (or at least moreso) by rearranging volatile quotes. It already annoyed me that she was so intent on giving MIA enough rope - another writer might have interrogated what she meant by "give war a chance" rather than leave it as a pat slogan - but this shows that she was actually manufacturing her own rope, which is just low. It's obvious that MIA will say some bona fide stupid shit, certainly enough to enliven a profile, without the writer having to warp and fabricate. I think MIA's response was pretty stylish - using raw audio rather than a rant to make her point - and (by also reproducing the fries conversation) witty. If I did this to an interviewee, then I wouldn't have anything to bitch about if she called me on it.

So, like, it's supposed to make MIA look better that she said those stupid things at different points and not just all at once? I'd be more inclined to support the artist's side of things in this instance if the artist in question a) wasn't already prone to making strident, boneheaded statements and b) didn't react to the profile with a Kanye-level degree of jackassery. Give her enough rope? MIA probably has rope on her rider.

Anyway, I read the article, heard MIA's side, and read the correction, and I still don't get the fuck point she was trying to make about going to the Grammys.

It's really not that understand to get her point when you read/hear the unedited quote. She's saying that part of her goal in being a successful musician was to publicise her political concerns, not just to get rich and go to the Grammys. Simple. If you already think she's an idiot then you're not going to be interested in working out what she's saying.