Here is the already divisive new M.I.A. video:

Quite simply, this is what punk rock looks like in the globalized digital age—M.I.A. is the Clash, only not pasty and male. If this video—not only her first for the new album but also the first since her artistic and personal split with producer/boyfriend Diplo—represents the direction M.I.A.’s heading with her new material then we’re in for a wonderful, confounding record.

What arguably made Arular and especially Piracy Funds Terrorism work so well was the wedding of M.I.A.’s unapologetic third-world liberation party platform to Diplo’s omnivorous consumption and regurgitation of bootleg CDs. Without Diplo’s digital crate digging and populist polish to temper her, we find M.I.A. delving even deeper into the rhetoric and iconography of the real third world, rather than the exoticized party slums of Blender magazine articles, where in M.I.A.’s words Diplo “WAS GONE TO SAVE STRIPPERS IN BRAZIL (COZ they ALWAYS NEED MUSIC TO DANCE TO).” Awesome! In contrast, M.I.A. is straight running with Liberian rebels. If she’s only playing with rhetoric and iconography, she’s going to some pretty serious lengths to do so.

Then there’s the beat. As was pointed out in the comments thread of the video posting, M.I.A.’s quoted as saying she called the song “Bird Flu” because “the beat’s gon’ kill everybody,” and she’s right. It’s gonna kill the fans hoping for a twerky club anthem, and it’s going to kill everyone predicting some sophomore slump or faddish fade out. The beat, to western ears, is unfamiliar and not club-ready, full of tinkling hand percussion and without the serious bass hits of her previous singles. The chicken scratching sounds unsanitary like a barnyard or an open air market—it’s the furthest possible thing from the club. And it’s brilliant.

Then there’s the video: Mini M.I.A. child-labor hype girl, masked (armed?) kids breakdancing/not breakdancing, stern looking locals, and everywhere a kind of foreboding energy which suggests bird flu as the global south’s revenge on the imperialists. And in the middle of it all is M.I.A., gorgeous, wearing a watermelon (signifier!) tie-dye (signifier?) t-shirt, boasting about the Roca-wear modeling gigs she’s turned down and laughing off Visa inspections. Really, what is not to love?

Again, if this is what we can expect of M.I.A. post-Diplo and post-Arular, then it’s going to be a hell of a record. And again, I can’t wait to see how Timbaland fits into this.