"Spike Jonze: "I met her right before she put out her first record, in 2005, and she insisted she wasn't a musician. To this day, she doesn't consider herself a musician. She has this wide range of talents and influences — she's a Sri Lankan refugee who didn't speak a word of English before she was 10, yet she's also a child of Chuck D and the Pixies and Fight Club and MySpace. There are no borders for her. She made me realize that you don't have to be from the West to have a favorite Biggie song. We are all listening to the same music. Last summer she was performing in Philadelphia, and she showed up at the venue, and it was an armory building. She felt kind of weird about it and decided she wasn't going to perform there unless she acknowledged that, so she found a group of Army veterans against the Iraq war and had them come and speak as her opening act. That's her mission — it's personal and evolving, focused but totally spontaneous. She's always for the underdog. And no matter how many times she's on the Grammys, she'll always see herself as the underdog."

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More by M.I.A.

“GAVRAS: So let’s talk a little bit about being a fashion icon. Do you think, for example, that Saddam Hussein was a fashion icon?”

“Trent Reznor: "The only thing that I play in my car right now is Arular by a girl named M.I.A., the most innovative artist in years." 2005,”

“It's important for communities to be put together on a different basis. It's really shitty that we're taught to be really patriotic when 99 percent of the shit that we wear and we use and eat and everything comes from everywhere all the time, and musically, it's the same.”

“OK, let's go and explore the rest of the world, and how easy is it to put together music through found objects and stuff, and people, and ideas and certain electricity, certain environments.”

“GAVRAS: Yeah, he’s the best-dressed man on the planet.”

“John Legend: "M.I.A. is killing it right now. Great beats. Distinctive voice.”

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