Borders (M.I.A. song)
| "Borders" | ||||
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| Single by M.I.A. | ||||
| from the album AIM | ||||
| Released | 20 November 2015 | |||
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| Length | 4:11 | |||
| Label | Interscope | |||
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| M.I.A. singles chronology | ||||
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| Music video | ||||
| "Borders" on YouTube | ||||
| Professional ratings | |
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| Source | Rating |
| 411MANIA |   |
| Billboard |   |
| Renowned for Sound | |
"Borders" is a song by recording artist M.I.A. for her fifth studio album, AIM (2016). The track was written by M.I.A., Levi Lennox and Amish Patel, and has been described as an electronic song incorporating such musical styles as hip hop and world music.
M.I.A. reportedly wrote "Borders" in two hours, which is the quickest she has ever written a song. Lyrically, the song references current world problems and reflects on popular culture.
The single was made available for online streaming on 20 November 2015, but was pulled later the same day. It was released globally as a digital single on 27 November 2015, accompanied by its socially and politically charged music video which went viral and sparked controversy. Time magazine has named it one of the best videos of 2015.
"Borders" received mixed to positive feedback from music critics. The song and its lyrics have been described as "simplistic" while the track's verses where the phrase "what's up with that?" is repeated several times, have been referred to as both "extremely repetitive" and "undeniably catchy".
HotNewHipHop gave the track a 'Hottttt' rating, noting similarities to M.I.A.'s biggest hit to date, "Paper Planes".
The track entered the top 40 in Dance/Electronic charts and Twitter songs chart in the US, but did not impact mainstream music charts in any country except in France.
The video for the song was filmed in India, directed and edited by M.I.A. in collaboration with Sugu Arulpragasam and Tom Manaton. It tackles the issue of the 2015 European migrant crisis. The singer has a long history of speaking about the struggles of refugees in her music, which goes back as far as to her debut album, 2004's Arular. A former refugee herself, she relocated from the war-torn Sri Lanka to London with her family at the age of 10. M.I.A. revealed that none of the people appearing in the video were actors, but "real people" she acquired through street-casting and approaching actual refugee camps in the south of India where Sri Lankan Tamils live.
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