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‘Could you please come get me?’ M.I.A. says she used to work in a telemarketing call center selling software over the phone (thanks, Punjabi Boy). Could you get any more desi?

… she was working in a call centre selling computer software to people in Ohio. She’d once worked the same job in LA.

The strain of being so mainstream drove her into Compton

… having fallen in love with hip-hop, she was going to move to South Central LA and become a gangsta’s bitch. It was a move both rebellious and reactionary. ‘I’m glad I went that far into it. I was the best hoochie on the West Coast at the time. I had the best clothes ‘cos I was coming from England and really good at shoplifting. I had Versace on before Lil’ Kim started rapping about it ‘cos the only place I could steal at was Harvey Nicks, where it was sooo easy. So I studied, like, the whole thing out in Compton: how the best you could do is be there for your man, be really good at sex, throw barbecues in the park, have babies and keep that unit together with the money that you get.’

Sadly, her black audiences aren’t getting her — she’s not quite Maya Vanilli, but gangsta isn’t totally prêt-à-porter:

This audience don’t understand why she’s covered head to toe in a baggy Sri Lankan print blouse and billowy trousers with its flashes of green in the print, which turn out, on closer inspection, to be the Incredible Hulk’s fist.

But she does have compelling memories of poverty in Sri Lanka:

… malnutrition had left Maya without most of her teeth. One of her last childhood memories of Sri Lanka is having her gums cut open with rice grain. ‘They don’t even do it fast, it took 45 minutes. But I wanted teeth so bad … you don’t understand.’ She came to Britain waiting for them to grow in and would hold her lips over her gums, staring long hours at herself in the mirror.

I suppose ‘terrorist’ isn’t usually mentioned in the biodata:

… her mother met her father through an arranged marriage, having been told he was an engineer. ‘Ever since she was a baby she was raised to be the housewife that all Sri Lankan women are meant to be. She couldn’t play out the fantasy ‘cos she didn’t have a husband. Him going away was worse for her. All the women were like, “He didn’t even die? He just left you with two children, what’s wrong with you? Fuck him starting a revolution, he isn’t at home!”‘

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Check out D’Arcy, a Brit indie pop group with an ’80s fashion fixation (obligatory M.I.A. reference via AiM):

[The band was] founded three years ago by Ashish Dharsi, the band’s vocalist and rhythm guitarist, and Tristan Evans, who plays lead guitar… “When I started as a solo singer songwriter a friend was designing a flyer and wrote my name on it as D’Arcy instead of Dharsi thinking that’s how it was spelt. I liked it and we have stuck with it and it’s attracting a lot of support, particularly from our Irish fans.” [Link]

Well, of course that’s what you get when you pronounce your pukka desi name in that posh Brit accent Ashish makes a much more interesting Dharsi than Martin Henderson.

Listen here (MP3).

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M.I.A. and Rekha spun sets in sweltering Central Park today. BrooklynVegan, center of all things Maya, hasn’t posted a review, but here are photos from Death of a Party (the full set of photos flickers here and here). She hankers for the ’80s with a swirl of Japanese schoolgirl. One commenter says:

They told DJ Rekha during her set that it was the biggest crowd that Summerstage saw all season.

Inablogadavida wonders:

Seriously, there were 12 million people in line, and I was 12,000,001. So, no, I didn’t even come close to getting in. In fact, from where I was sitting, M.I.A. sounded like Rosie Perez reciting the morning call to prayer through a cardboard tube. Why can I never manage to jump on a pop-culture bandwagon before it shows up on T.R.L.?

Cicatrix reviews the set in the comments:

Rekha mixed it up with Bhangra, dancehall, some hip-hop, and really cheekily, a few baile funk songs at the end…

… Diplo next… his set was surprisingly boring. He didn’t play any baile funk until the very end… I guess the crowd wasn’t feeling “Walks Like an Egyptian” mashing into anything…

Ok, MIA. They unfurled a full length banner behind her… and brought out some sort of papier mache helicopter… and you guessed it – a 3’x6′ cardboard TIGER… I grit my teeth as the two girl pranced out to the edge of the stage and gave military salutes…

MIA wore blue lace calf-length leggings with a large belted crazy color top, piles of bracelets and hoop earings the diameter of hubcabs. With a high sideways ponytail…

The crowd ate up everything. I was scowling at first, then got teary, then started chanting along and bouncing, then felt a headache coming on… I was really surprised at how many people knew all the words. really! It was a special moment for disenfranchised women when she held the mic to an audience of hipsters who chanted back “I can get squeaky so you can come and oil me” during ‘Hombre.” My jaw is bruised from dropping.

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Director Wes Anderson, in addition to “hearting Walis,” also has a soft spot for Kumar Pallana.  Why?

Wes Anderson has given Kumar Pallana (Pagoda [in The Royal Tenenbaums] ) a part in each of his movies (with the exception of The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004)). Pallana used to work at his favorite Coffee shop in Dallas.

Pallana is actually quite a character:

Born in India in 1918, Pallana began as a juggler and singer, performing for small Indian communities throughout Africa. In 1946 he took his act to America, eventually appearing on several television shows, including The Mickey Mouse Show and Captain Kangaroo. Pallana also toured nightclubs in Las Vegas, Paris and Beirut, combining magic, rope tricks, comedy and plate-spinning under the name “Kumar of India.”

Apul informs me that the new video for the song “Clock In Now” by the group The Deathray Davies also features Pallana and some of his tricks.  When I am that old I hope to be nearly that cool.