M.I.A.

Like many music-obsessed New Yorkers, Oliver Truman navigates the honeycomb of city streets with headphones plugged into his ears. Mr. Truman, a 26-year-old marketing assistant with a beanstalk frame and curly-q’d chestnut hair, has a playlist called “walking” on his iPod, loaded with songs ranging from The Buzzcocks to The Four Tops.

On a recent weekend afternoon, he listened to The Jam while flipping through a magazine and Screwdriver while depositing a check at the bank.  read more »

Lacoste’s famous crocodile logo was conspicuously absent from the label’s party at the Bowery Hotel on Saturday, Feb. 2, though the show that morning, held in the tents at Bryant Park, was full of preppy duds: brightly colored patterns and white V-neck sweaters. J’ai adoré the cute gray trench!

Young guests working the surfer-skater-thug look that has become standard in this part of the city bounced from open bar to open bar, playing pool and lounging on couches while D.J. Stretch Armstrong “spun” the new M.I.A. record.  read more »

“LOOK I KNOW THERE ARE HATERS OUT THERE, I DEAL WITH IT EVERYDAY THATS NO FUCKING BIG DEAL AND IVE DEALT WITH WORSE IN MY LIFE, A FEW PEOPLE TALKING SHIT DONT MATTER TO ME, BUT TWISTING TRUTH ISNT THE LESSON I WANNA LEARN IN MY TIME IN MUSIC, SO WHO EVER THAT IS DOING IT , I WANNA SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT”

That’s Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam, better known as the Sri-Lankan/British hip hop performer M.I.A., writing an open letter to her fans on her MySpace page. She’s referring to the uproar about her new video, Paper Planes. First, M.I.A.’s touring schedule forced her to shoot the video in New York against her wishes. Then she performed the single on the David Letterman show recently, and the gun shot sounds in the song were changed to some kind of sad, too-taught bongo beat. The gunshots were subsequently censored for the MTV video premiere’s broadcast yesterday.  read more »