Arular Tour

Tour details

The Arular Tour setlist featured songs from her debut album Arular. Some mixes from her mixtape Piracy Funds Terrorism were also performed. M.I.A. did not follow the same setlist at every show. M.I.A. spoke in 2005 of wanting to make her live set "minimal," inspired by gigs of acts such as electroclash musician Peaches which she attended whilst travelling and filming a documentary on her. M.I.A.'s concert following the Drake Hotel gig received a response described as "phenomenal" by organiser Jacob Smid, with attendees already knowing many of her songs.

Sets were sometimes decorated with palm fronds. The stage featured coloured drapes, canvasses and flags she created with prints of her graffiti stencils, paintings, and her album and singles artwork. These featured pictures of anonymous rebel soldiers, tigers, tanks and guns amid jagged colourful patterns. Her stage attire featured similar prints. She wore many contrasting outfits, nearly every item of clothing hand made by friends such as Carri Mundane and herself. In some shows, a video screen displayed images of tigers, looping fighter jets, maps of London and oil rigs.

Coachella 2005

M.I.A ended her set in the Gobi tent at the 2005 Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival with the song "Galang", leading to an encore in response to crowd enthusiasm, a rarity for the festival and the first tent encore at Coachella. Describing the performance she said, "When I played three years ago, it was such a crazy moment. It was my first festival and I had only done about five shows in my entire life...They dismantled the stage and had to put it back together because all the people started going, 'M.I.A! M.I.A!' I don't think I'd ever be able to do something like that again, because it was my moment."

Later tour

Additionally, M.I.A. co-headlined tours with Roots Manuva and LCD Soundsystem during 2005. Her dates from 10 May at the Commodore Ballroom, Canada to 12 June at the 9:30 Club, US were performed with LCD Soundsystem. M.I.A. performed with backup singer Cherry and DJ Diplo on many dates. Spank Rock opened for M.I.A. on a few dates, as did DJ's Rekha, Marlboro and Contra who made appearances on some dates during the tour. Concerts took place at club venues and music festivals. She joined Gwen Stefani on her 2005 tour and ended the Arular tour with performances in Japan in February 2006. M.I.A. performed several sold-out shows during her tour, with Aziz Ansari, Feist, David Byrne, Nas, Kelis, Matt Damon and Natalie Portman among those attending concerts. Recording for her second album Kala followed this tour, which preceded the 2007 KALA Tour.

Set list

This is the set-list from M.I.A.'s sold-out concert at the club S.O.B.s in Manhattan U.S..

• "Pull Up the People"
• "Fire Fire"
• "Sunshowers"
• "Hombre"
• "M.I.A."
• "Amazon"
• "10 Dollar"
• "Bucky Done Gun"
• "Galang"
• "U.R.A.Q.T."
• "Bingo"

Tour dates

Notes

References

References

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4. Moayeri, Lily. "And Interview with Maya Arul a.k.a. M.I.A. – Arul on recording Arular". Remixmag.
5. (2 May 2005). "Coldplay, NIN Top Coachella With Emotional Performances". MTV.
6. Eliscu, Jenny. (28 April 2008). "My Coachella: M.I.A. Gets the Bodies Moving".
7. Chekuru, Kavitha. (25 July 2005). "M.I.A. Announces Headlining Tour". [[Pitchforkmedia]].
8. E. Davis, Carolyn. (26 April 2005). "M.I.A. Forges Her Own Path". [[MTV]].
9. Inoue, Todd. (12 October 2005). "Chairman M.I.A.". [[Metro Silicon Valley.
10. (23 February 2005). "M.I.A. story - Aziz Ansari featuring Eugene Mirman". [[YouTube]].
11. Feist. (5 May 2005). "A Torch Singer with an ancient sound". [[The New York Times]].
12. Shapiro, Peter. (September 2024). "Talking about her revolution". [[The Times.
13. Levy, Ariel. (November 2005). "Natalie Portman will change your life". [[Blender magazine.