Day After Day #246: Paper Planes

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Paper Planes (2007)

Sampling has been a big part of popular music for more than 40 years, but you need more than a great sample to make a great song. On "Paper Planes," British-Sri Lankan rapper M.I.A. had both, using the intro to the Clash's "Straight to Hell" as her intro as well, providing a great fakeout (for Clash fans, anyway; now, people hear it and think of "Paper Planes"). But M.I.A.'s song stands on its own both as a political statement and a catchy-as-hell iconic jam.

Born in London, Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam moved to Sri Lanka with her family when she was six months old. The family returned to London when she was 11 as refugees after the Sri Lankan Civil War broke out. She began working as a visual artist, filmmaker and designer in 2000. 

After meeting Justine Frischmann of Elastica, Arulpragasam was hired to create the cover art for Elastica's 2000 album The Menace. She went on the road with the band to document their tour and was encouraged by opening act Peaches to start making music. She took the name M.I.A. (for Missing in Acton) and put together a demo tape that featured dancehall, electro, jungle and world music sounds. After uploading her music to MySpace in June 2004, the major labels started chasing her and she signed with XL Recordings. While she was working on her debut album Arular, she released a mashup mixtape called Piracy Funds Terrorism, which was produced by U.S. DJ Diplo; it mashed up vocal tracks from Arular with samples of other recordings like the Bangles' "Walk Like an Egyptian," Jay-Z's "Big Pimpin'" and Salt-n-Pepa's "Push It."

The MP3 blog era of the early 2000s brought her to my attention in 2004, when her songs "Sunflowers" and "Galang" were featured heavily, and then the mixtape made the rounds. Arular came out in March 2005 and was a critical success; it only hit #198 on the Billboard 200 but it got up to #3 on the Top Dance/Electronic Albums. And in the post-Napster world, albums weren't what they once were, anyways.

M.I.A. played a bunch of festival and club dates, toured with LCD Soundsystem and Gwen Stefani and built up a ton of buzz for her next album, 2007's Kala. She continued mixing in different styles of music, from Bollywood and Tamil film music to Brazilian funk to African folk and it all worked. She had planned to work with producer Timbaland for most of the album, but couldn't get a long-term work visa to enter the U.S. The holdup was likely due to government concern over her support for the pro-secession Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka (which her father had been involved with), which led some to label her a terrorist. 

She recorded "Paper Planes" in the Bed-Stuy neighborhood of Brooklyn, which gave her the inspiration for the lyrics. "I was thinking about living there, waking up every morning--it's such an African neighborhood," she told The Fader in 2007. "I was going to get patties at my local and just thinking that really the worst thing that anyone can say [to someone these days] is some shit like 'What I wanna do is come and get your money.' People don't really feel like immigrants or refugees contribute to culture in any way. That they're just leeches that suck from whatever. So in the song, I say 'All I wanna do is [sound of gun shooting and reloading, cash register opening] and take your money.' I did it in sound effects. It's up to you how you want to interpret. America is so obsessed with money, I'm sure they'll get it."

Instead of paying tribute to making money like a gangster, the song pokes fun at the post-9/11 paranoia in the U.S. at the time that had people here believing immigrants were here to destroy us all. (And as I write this 17 years later, things haven't gotten any better, if the idiotic claims about immigrants eating pets are any indication.) The "paper planes" of the title refer to counterfeit visa documents, which the song's protagonist can hook you up with. 

"I fly like paper, get high like planes/If you catch me at the border, I got visas in my name/If you come around here, I make 'em all day/I get one done in a second if you wait/Sometimes I think sittin' on trains/Every stop I get to, I'm clocking that game/Everyone's a winner, we're making our fame/Bona fide hustler making my name."

The chorus sounds like a call back from the 1992 Wreckx-N-Effect jam "Rump Shaker": "All I wanna do is [gun noises]/And a- [cash register noise]/And take your money/All I wanna do is- [gun noises]/And a- [cash register]/And take your money."

The song wasn't an immediate hit, but once it was used in the trailer of the movie Pineapple Express and then featured in the Oscar darling Slumdog Millionaire, "Paper Planes" totally blew up, going to #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the U.S. The video featured M.I.A. working on a food truck and dancing through the streets of Bed-Stuy, but MTV censored the song's cannabis reference and the gunshot sound effects.

"Pirate skull and bones/Sticks and stones and weed and bongs/Running when we hit 'em/Lethal poison for the system/No one on the corner has swagger like us/Hit me on my burner prepaid wireless/We pack and deliver like UPS trucks/Already going to hell, just pumping that gas."

The song was remixed by 50 Cent, covered in concert by Rihanna and Dizzee Rascal and the line "No one on the corner has swagger like us" was turned into a new song by Jay-Z, Kanye West, Lil Wayne and T.I. At the 2009 Grammys, an extremely pregnant M.I.A. joined the group to perform "Swagga Like Us/Paper Planes." She also worked with A.R. Rahman on the song "O...Saya" for Slumdog Millionaire, which was nominated for an Academy Award. She became the first person of Asian descent to be nominated for an Oscar and a Grammy in the same year.

Since then, she's had an interesting 15 years or so, releasing four studio albums but also stirring up plenty of controversy with her political views. She was a supporter of Julian Assange and Wikileaks, has come out against the COVID-19 vaccine and 5G and most recently, endorsed Donald Trump after RFK Jr. dropped out of the 2024 presidential race. Oh, and this year she launched her own fashion line, which includes a "tin foil hat" that supposedly blocks 99.99% of WiFi, 4G and 5G from the brain. 

So there's that. But all that wackadoo shit doesn't change the fact that M.I.A. released some truly brilliant music over the years. Right? Right.

Day After Day #169: Fix Up, Look Sharp

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Fix Up, Look Sharp (2003)

Kids, gather round and hear the tale of how Billy Squier became a hip hop icon. By 1980, Squier had already been around for a few years fronting the band Piper, which released two albums and opened for KISS in 1977 (they shared the same management company). 

Squier released his solo debut The Tale of the Tape in the spring of 1980 and although it barely made a dent in the Billboard 200 (hitting #169), it has become legendary thanks to the song "The Big Beat." It's a straightahead rocker that didn't chart, but it features one of the most famous drum sounds in music history. Recorded in Levon Helm's (yes, that Levon Helm) barn in Woodstock, the drums were played by Bobby Chouinard with overdubs from Squier hitting a snare case with his hands. 

Rap producers liked the sound and sampled or recreated it in many songs, most notably U.T.F.O.'s "Roxanne, Roxanne," which came out in 1984. When the group blew off a promotional appearance on a radio show, 14-year-old Lolita Shante Gooden was enlisted to make an answer song called "Roxanne's Revenge," which also featured the Squier beat. U.T.F.O. and their producers Full Force then released another answer song by The Real Roxanne, which led to a cottage industry of Roxanne answer songs over the next year.

Meanwhile, Squier was enjoying the early '80s himself, having blown up with his 1981 hard rock album Don't Say No and the big hit "The Stroke." The newly launched MTV played his performance-based videos constantly and Squier became an arena rock staple, opening for Queen and later headlining shows with Def Leppard opening for him. But even as his fourth album Signs of Life was becoming a hit in 1984, Squier's success was derailed by the Kenny Ortega-directed video for "Rock Me Tonite," which featured Squier dancing around a bedroom in a pink tank top. Almost immediately, Squier's shows stopped selling out and his popularity took a nosedive. He released four more albums with some modest radio hits, but by 1993, Squier walked away from music. He released one more album, 1998's acoustic blues release Happy Blue.

Fast forward five years and U.K. rapper Dizzee Rascal is preparing his debut album when his producer played him "The Big Beat." The booming drum beat and Squier's vocals were sampled into "Fix Up, Look Sharp" and a hit was born. Well, in the U.K., anyway, where it went to #17 on the singles chart. It didn't chart in the U.S. but it caught a lot of buzz thanks to the nascent indie rock MP3 blog scene, where bloggers became tastemakers for folks like me. I'm pretty sure I've never heard "Fix Up, Look Sharp" on the radio, but I downloaded Dizzee Rascal's album Boy in Da Corner off eMusic and played the hell out of it on my iPod.

"Fix up, look sharp/Don't make me pick up with sign get park/Hear the bang, see the spark/Duck down, lay down just/Fix up, look sharp."

Squier is prominently featured in the song with the chorus from "The Big Beat": "I got the big beat/I hear the sound/I got the big beat/I get on down."

Surrounded by Chouinard's thundering drums, a brash Dizzee really rips it up.

"I've heard the gossip from the street to the slammer/They're tryin' to see if Dizzee stays true to his grammar/Being a celebrity don't mean shit to me/Fuck the glitz and the glamour, hey I'm with the blicks and gamma/Because they're talkin' 'bout rushin'/Talk behind my back but to my face they say nothin'/Stand up in the parks, keep a firm, steady stance/Keep the beanies touchin', keep the beanies hot flushin'."

The album ended up winning the Mercury Prize for best album from the U.K. and Ireland, peaked at #23 on the album chart and sold more than 250,000 copies worldwide by 2004. Dizzee Rascal singlehandedly brought grime music to the forefront and became the U.K.'s first internationally recognized rap star.

"Fix Up, Look Sharp" led to another hip hop rejuvenation for Squier, with "The Big Beat" sample showing up in Jay-Z's "99 Problems," Alicia Keys' "Girl on Fire" and Kanye and Pusha T's "Looking for Trouble." In truth, the sample had already been showing up in varied songs including Beck's "Soul Suckin' Jerk," Britney Spears' "Oops! I Did It Again," A Tribe Called Quest's "We Can Get Down" and Alessia Cara's "Scars to Your Beautiful." The song has been sampled around 300 times, reportedly earning Squier millions in royalties. "The Stroke" has also been sampled in many songs, including Eminem's "Berserk" and Mickey Avalon's "Stroke Me." Sadly, Chouinard died in 1997 at age 44 of a massive heart attack.

Meanwhile, Dizzee Rascal has released seven more albums, including Don't Take It Personal earlier this year. He remains a U.K. phenomenon, but he's done well for himself. Not as well as Squier, who spends most of his time volunteering for the Central Park Conservancy in New York while the royalty checks keep rolling in.

Day After Day #100: Me Myself and I

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Me Myself and I (1989)

It's always a momentous year right before the move into a new decade, but 1989 was an interesting year for music as well. Just as alternative rock was moving more into the mainstream, hip hop was evolving, too. Gangsta rap was emerging with NWA and Ice-T, political rap was in the forefront with Public Enemy and party rap remained strong with new voices like Digital Underground. There was also a move to a more positive sound, which was led by De La Soul.

A trio out of Long Island, De La Soul was formed in high school by Kelvin "Posdunos" Mercer, David "Trugoy the Dove" Jolicoeur and Vincent "Maseo" Mason. They used a ton of interesting samples; in addition to James Brown and George Clinton (who were sampled by everybody), De La Soul sampled songs by Hall and Oates, Johnny Cash, Steely Dan, Eric Burdon and War, Liberace, the Turtles, Steve Miller Band, Kraftwerk, Billy Joel, the Monkees and the Rascals. In fact, they used so many samples that their back catalog wasn't available for download or streaming until last year, when a deal was worked out over the sample royalties.

They rapped about peace and positivity, which led some to call them hippies, which they pushed back on. De La Soul often rapped about D.A.I.S.Y, which stood for "Da Inner Sound, Y'all," and referred often to the Daisy Age. The group's first album, 3 Feet High and Rising, came out in February 1989 and was an immediate hit. 

De La Soul's sound and aesthetic was so original when it came out because they defied hip hop convention by avoiding tough guy poses and posturing, instead embracing wonder and weirdness. The album also introduced the concept of skits between songs, which has since become commonplace and somewhat annoying.

"Me Myself and I" was the fifth single released off 3 Feet High and Rising. The main sample came from Funkadelic's "(Not Just) Knee Deep," a 15-minute funk jam from 1979. 

"Mirror, mirror on the wall/Tell me, mirror, what is wrong?/Can it be my De La Clothes/Or is it just my De La Soul?/What I do ain't make believe/People say I sit and try/But when it comes to being De La/It's just me, myself and I."

De La Soul used the song to respond to being called the hippies of hip hop, noting that they weren't just a gimmick.

"Now you tease my Plug One style/And my Plug One spectacles/You say Plug One and Two are hippies/No we're not, that's pure plug bull/Always pushing that we formed an image/There's no need to lie/When it comes to being Plug One/It's just me, myself and I."

The song went to #34 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #1 on the Dance Club Songs, Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs and Hot Rap Songs charts. It also went to #1 in the Netherlands, where a TV station had made a documentary about the group when they were unknowns.

The album also spawned hits with "Say No Go" and "The Magic Number." Critics also lauded the album, which placed on numerous best-of lists for the year and for all time. De La Soul has had a successful career, collaborating with Mos Def, Gorillaz, Yo La Tengo and many others. 

Sadley, Trugoy the Dove died in 2023, just before the release of all of De La Soul's music on streaming services. The surviving members have continued to tour, opening for Wu-Tang Clan and Nas last fall.