By now, anyone who has paid even the faintest attention to pop music has a pretty good idea of what M.I.A. sounds like. Her vocal stylings are unmistakable. She has a slick lip and a pitch-playful cadence that our ears register immediately.
So what the hell does Lady Gaga think she's doing in Wale's new song "Chillin'"? After listening to the song twice (admittedly not very carefully), I was shocked to learn that it was Lady Gaga's voice I was hearing and not M.I.A.'s. Lady Gaga somehow managed to lift M.I.A.'s signature vocal idiom right out of her throat without even attempting to personalize it. It's just straight M.I.A. Except that it's not.
To confuse matters further, Wale references M.I.A. in the song twice, first naming her in a pun and then pulling a line from "Paper Planes." Coincidence? I doubt it.
