One is the New Zealand sensation who’s straddling the charts and minds the world over with the recent release of her debut album, the other is the Blur-sampling, Sri Lanakan-born, British-bred songstress who’s been butting heads with her own label to release her long-awaited fourth album.
Now a smart cookie has sought to pair Lorde and M.I.A. together in a new mash-up that capitalises on the huge success of the former’s reigning ‘Royals’ single with the latter’s breakout 2008 hit, ‘Paper Planes’.
The concept is simple and the execution deceptively smooth; pair Lorde’s luscious stacked vocal harmonies that lyrically skewer celebrity culture with the popping guitars and chordal shifts of M.I.A.’s scatty hit, which in turn rotates on a key sample of ‘Straight To Hell’ by The Clash. (So maybe Lorde vs The Clash would be more accurate?)
The mash-up is a pretty logical fit, as the 16-year-old singer’s slinky vocals slide around and between the backing, while the cash register and gunshot sound FXs of ‘Paper Planes’ still prop up for the hooky chorus.
American DJ Mike Biggz, a self-described “tastemaker, radio & music producer” from the Bay Area, is the man behind ‘Royal Planes’, which has already earned over 25,000 streams on Biggz’ own SoundCloud page, as Consequence Of Sound reports.
Biggz recently acknowledged on his Twitter that he now his work cut out for him in carving out a successful follow-up: “Now I gotta live up to this little hype. So what would happen if you mashed up Outkast with the band America… oh, you want to know, trust,” he recently posted.
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Interestingly enough, DJ Biggz isn’t the first to think of pairing the two female artists in hit-laden harmony, with Buzzfeed spotlighting a similar albeit slightly rougher version by Australian DJ Amos Wellings back in September, while a mock-up from online mash-up act SmadaLeinad dates back to August. Regardless of whichever came first, it doesn’t detract from the results.
As for the ladies at the source of the mash-up, Lorde has just completed a sold out Australian tour, concluding with two packed dates at Melbourne’s Corner Hotel, where our Tone Deaf reviewer remarked that the singer’s “future burns brightly,” adding that: “Lorde is readymade brilliance. At 16, she has the mind, class and nous to say what we all think. At 16, she has the talent and reach to inspire others to take her lead.”
The Kiwi singer-songwriter was in the country to promote her debut record, Pure Heroine, which was recently crowned as the second fastest selling album of the year after it debuted at the #1 spot on the ARIA Albums Chart, adding to Lorde’s fistful of historic accolades, including becoming the longest reigning female on the US charts while peaking at #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 with ‘Royals’.
Backing up her commercial dominance, Lorde – real name Ella Yelich-O’Connor – is whip-smart to boot, tackling sexism and industry hype in her own wisened words in an insightful editorial piece recently. Lorde will next check in Down Under as part of the Laneway 2014 festival lineup next February alongside a strong female-centric lineup of Haim, Savages, Adalita, CHVRCHES, Warpaint, The Jezabels and many more.
Meanwhile, the other half of the ‘Royal Planes’ mash-up has just released another cut from her much-delayed Matangi album. M.I.A. recently leaked another single from the troubled release online, in the form of new single ‘Y.A.L.A.’, a mid-tempo, glitchy jam that criticises the YOLO phenomenon with lyrics that quiz, “If you only live once, why we keep doing the same shit?” – the song’s title standing for ‘You Always Live Again’.
That’s a good mantra for the once-scrapped documentary about the making of the stalled Matangi LP, with M.I.A. recently confirming that production on the fascinating-looking feature chronicling her career is back on after the director walked from the project, saying he’d “rather die than finish” the film.
