Rap princess M.i.a. was horrified when music industry executives told her to make music in the style of Lily Allen - insisting she doesn't understand why anyone would want to sound like the British pop star.

While Allen's songs are about exes and drug-taking little brothers, the British-Sri Lankan music sensation takes a more political stance and travels the world looking for musical inspiration.

She tells London's Time Out magazine, "I don't understand why people make me want to make music that's a join-the-dots thing by numbers. I find it really difficult when people say, 'Aw, you should have made a song like Lily Allen, that would have been so great.'"

"(My stuff) is dirty, it's scummy, it's got flies on it and it's got all the ink and the dirt and the blood and the sweat."