Image by Coup d’Orielle via Wikimedia
M.I.A. has been building up to the release of her new album, AIM, by releasing a succession of stunning tracks. “Bird Song,” “Borders,” “Go Off,” and the Zayn Malik-featuring “Freedun” have already dropped, a big chunk of the first half of the record. We know, too, that it’ll feature production from Blaqstarr, Diplo, and Skrillex.
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Today she released another track from the record as Zane Lowe’s Beats 1 World Record. “Foreign Friend” features Jamaican artist Dexta Daps on vocals and serves as an updated album version of a snippet she released back in March.
In an interview after the track played out, she talked to Lowe about the story about the song:
“I spend a lot of time in the Carribean and, since I’m not allowed to go to Sri Lanka since the government banned me[…] the Carribean is like Sri Lanka without the war. I’ve been going there since 2000. So I went there to check on my friends, just to have some time out. Dex’s song was on the radio 24/7. He was the man, basically. All the kids were like ‘You’ve gotta work with him, you’ve gotta work with him.’ They sort of pushed me into it, I just wanted to do something that’d make my friends happy. So I reached out and he said ‘Yeah.’ We sort of met in Jamaica. Then I found out he wrote this song called ‘Morning Love’ which happened to be my favorite song at the time. And it was just like, no question about it, I had to get some Dexta Time. But obviously, when we got together, it could only go as far as being best friends.”
Check it out below.
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