Who told Iggy Azalea to stop working with black people from Atlanta and pretending to be the love child of Charli Baltimore and Diamond from Crime Mob?
Although “Fancy,” that fake-ass DJ Mustard track, was a monstrous hit, beyond that song, the only other decent ones Azalea ever managed to release were “Pu$$y” and “Murda Bizness,” featuring T.I. Those were the songs that first gained her national attention and a small but solid and eager fan base.
Make no mistake—her fraudulent blaccent has annoyed me quite a few times—but a bop is a bop, beloveds. Yes, cultural appropriation is bad, I should know better, yadda-yadda. That said, if you’re going to steal our shit, steal it correctly. Give me an ole’ nasty, problematic bop. When the ancestors greet me with their disappointment, I need them to at least know it was for something I danced to emphatically.
Sure, “Black Widow” featuring Rita Ora was a hit, but it made a suspicious character—why does an Australian white girl sound like that?—even more gimmicky and, subsequently, all the easier to dismiss.
Those generic pop hits are exactly why Azalea has been trying for more than a year now to bring that old thing back. Well, trying and failing miserably ... bless her heart. This would include the singles “Azillion” and “Team.” Those songs sound like the kind white people make when they want to sound a lil’ black, but not too black. They’re more or less the audible version of greens purchased from Neiman Marcus.
Sadly, the same goes for her latest release, “Mo Bounce.” If someone tells you that this song slaps, tell them that you will be praying extra hard that Obamacare is not repealed and the health industry is not thrown into disarray, because they need medical attention. This song ain’t it. It’s not even a lil’ bit of it.
It’s not lit or even in possession of the slightest flicker. The newly released music video isn’t much better. It reminds me of a commercial from a major company desperately trying to look cool to young people. Wait, is that basically a Black Eyed Peas video? Please advise.
In a recent interview with Zane Lowe, Azalea apologized for the delay of her new album and claimed that she was starting the project all over again.
“I promise you I had my whole record down and I scrapped the entire thing. It was good stuff; it’s not even that it was bad!” she explained. “I just had a lot of life changes right before I was supposed to drop my album, and I thought, ‘You know what? This is no longer reflective of what I want to say or what I want to talk about or who I am.’”
Translation: None of my singles were taking off and the label was like, “Oh, girl. Start over. We need that Vanilla Ice-meets-Nicki Minaj money.”
That’s understandable, but what’s baffling is why Azalea refuses to give T.I. a ring and go ask a bunch of honest black gays in Atlanta—she knows which ones I’m talking about ’cause they helped her ass out way back when—for some new help. I’m not trying to be her version of a Magical Negro in some stupid movie that should’ve never been made, but this is becoming painful to listen to.
It’s not that I believe in Azalea, but I do know that I’ve heard better. Good luck. Or whatever.