Video portrait by Erik Sanchez
A few days ago, M.I.A. dropped her first new track since 2013. "CanSeeCanDo" was posted up on her Soundcloud on Friday and, this being M.I.A., everyone has an opinion on what she is saying, or the message and politics within. Here are ours:
Safy-Hallan Farah: The text on the accompanying photo says a lot. "Wants the world to see nothing but success stories" is exactly the kind of collectivist bullshit, Ted Talk, curated-Best-Lives, dream-it-and-achieve-it world we're living in. Some people can't just have a can-do attitude—dream it—because DRONES. We're in fact blind. What are we seeing, except the highlight reel? I still really don't know what's happening in the song but I'm intrigued by the implications.
Jes Skolnik: This is one of her most sonically and politically direct songs in years, cutting to the core of the slogan "The personal is political". "Wanna get past history/ Wanna make a future with you" she urges in the face of omnipresent, seemingly omniscient planes and drones, reminding us that sheer, simple survival in a world that never ceases trying to wipe you out is the most radical act.
Molly Beauchemin: I feel like "CanSeeCanDo" is a hyperbolic manifestation of exactly what M.I.A. does well, because M.I.A. loves to combine anesthetic beats with Real Heavy Shit to point out the hypocrisy of nonchalance. She lures people into politics using dance-induced dumbness to make it palatable—like a mom trying to hide broccoli under the ketchup.
Initially when I heard it I thought dis beat sounded a lot like the creeping throb of 2NE1's "I Am The Best", which is one of those dance-yourself-stupid K-pop hits in the lineage of "Gangnam Style"—except she's re-appropriating the hypnotic quality for an explicitly different purpose, which slowly started to blow my mind. What I hadn't quite realized until hearing this song is how much the dullness in her voice suggests hypnosis, in the sense of mind control or brainwashing, which is some meta shit given the subject matter—censorship, war, being watched, being blind. She's singing "some people see drones" with the kind of enthusiasm that a 9-year-old boy gives an apology he doesn't mean—this mix of faux-resignation and apathy—which is exactly what she did in "Paper Planes", come to think of it, with "Some some I some I murder/ Some I some I let go". So the plain-speak makes perfect sense here given her history: This is the biggest topic she's ever covered and she sounds more bored than ever (and in that respect this song is super, unquestionably her).
David Turner: In the original SoundCloud description of "CanSeeCanDo", M.I.A. said "DEMOCRACY CONVERSATIONS ! TAMILS ARE STILL WAITING ! AND NO MY BEATS ARE NOT BETTER WITHOUT MY POLITICX." Of course in true M.I.A. fashion that sharp description was edited to read: "SMOKE AND JAZZ AND SAXOPHONE GONA GET MY SADE ON." At first the track appears to eavesdrop on a lover’s quarrel, then M.I.A. states "Some people see planes, some people see drones," quickly pushing aside the concerns of those who still wish she kept a line between personal and global politics, rather than tangling them inextricably. On the lightning bolt of a track "Boom Skit" from her last album Matangi, M.I.A. said "Brown girl, brown girl, turn your shit down/ You know America doesn’t wanna hear your sound." Thankfully #MayaSeason arrives for voices ready to speak whether people who are ready or not.
Jessica Hopper: I keep thinking how the line "make a future with you" would have a strictly romantic read in most people’s songs, but here, confronting things that are unseen, but still dreadfully impactful—the hope of simply living is the real message here. Who can outrun an enemy you can’t see—who has a chance to even live? Self determination doesn’t mean shit when bombs are going off. The flatness of her delivery, and that final schoolyard taunting NA NA NA NA speaks to the fact of war, to its everydayness outside the first world. Also? The song is good. And a reminder of how easy it is to still be excited about everything she does, something to hold us until summer beyond periodic thunderous replays of "Bad Girls".
Mia Nguyen: The idea of chasing aspirations is romanticized in "CanSeeCanDo". It rides on the sentiment, "it always seems impossible until it's done." Our minute insecurities hinder us. In order to protect ourselves from the harshness of reality, we stitch security blankets in order to safeguard our dreams, protect what we have. M.I.A. surrenders herself when she sings "there are only a few things that can keep me off my track." It's a reminder that we are sometimes too close to something to see it clearly.