It’s all too appropriate that the mysterious 28-year-old Brit-by-way-of-Sri Lanka who’s been dominating Internet blogs and making indie-snobs drool for nearly a year without ever creating a full-length album would go by the name M.I.A.

After releasing several hard-to-find singles via her European imprint, XL Records, M.I.A. has become a posh name drop — the secret handshake for the hipster fraternity. And when Piracy Funds Terrorism, Vol. 1, her party-bangin’ mixtape with Philly DJ, Diplo, surfaced in late 2004, it was clear fuses were about to blow.

Luckily for Maya Arulpragasam (try saying that five times fast, or even once slowly), she’s managed to live up to the hype and the loftiness of her alias on her first LP, Arular.

M.I.A.’s wacked-out mashup of electro-pop hip-hop reggae whatchamacallit is a Best Buy employee’s worst nightmare and an increasingly experimental pop-savoring public’s wet dream. The album is intelligent video game score; part ’80s, part grime party, part outer space future funk, Arular is both fun-loving and politically conscious, and neatly wrapped in a 40-minute candy-coated shell.

While the album is heavily produced, the lack of identifiable instruments makes it sound somehow organic. Individual lines of crazy electro beeps and hums come in and out of clutter and back M.I.A.’s raps and chants.

“I got the bombs to make you blow/I’ve got the beats to make you bang,” she sings on “Pull Up The People” over a dirty drum machine buzz.

Elsewhere on the album, M.I.A. is just as smug: “New York quiet down I need to make a sound,” she spits on the head-boppin’ “Bucky Done Gone.”

Arular’s best tracks come midway through the album. “Amazon” could have been recorded at a tribal ritual deep in the forest: “Somewhere in the Amazon they’re holding me ransom/Hello! This is M.I.A./Could you please come get me?” she pleads over handclaps, choppy vocal samples and xylophone.

Likewise, “Bingo” is an immediately catchy hip-hop jaunt. Growing urgency emanates from her voice like she’s thinking “T-minus one minute until lift-off” the entire track. Hollow electronic bangs, lasers and a steady drumbeat fill the background.

Like Dizzee Rascal, M.I.A. is the soul of the streets, spitting London slang and calling out to all the homeboys and girls, making their presence known. She is deservedly cocky and not afraid to flaunt her all-over-the-map style. Both cultural statement and critic, M.I.A. seemingly does it all on Arular.

But after meeting critics’ wildest dreams and answering all the lingering what-ifs, there is only one question left for M.I.A.: “What’s next?”