Would the real Iggy Azalea please stand up
Iggy Azalea seems to have lost her mojo if a review of her gig at the South By Southwest festival is anything to go by.
However something of the old Iggy is still in there.
In the opinion of one LA Times reviewer, the Australian rapper appeared to phone in her performance as the headline act at Samsung's Milk Music Lounge at SXSW in Austin, Texas on Wednesday.
"She embodied no palpable sense of struggle in moodier cuts like Don't Need Y'all, about how fame feels `like a curse latched to my blessing'," LA Times reviewer Mikael Wood wrote.
"As she ran through the song with a blank look in her eyes, Azalea seemed drained by the task at hand - not just putting in her 45 minutes for Samsung but figuring out the next step in her career," Wood wrote.
The show was important for Azalea: it was her first performance since she announced the postponement of her tour, The Great Escape - which she blamed on production delays.
She told the Associated Press that she didn't want to compromise her creative vision and was going to tour in September "because the arenas are so far in advanced book, it was kind of their next slot."
The tour had been slated to kickoff in May.
Last year was an incredibly positive year for Azalea as she rode high in the US charts with her hit song Fancy, but this year has been beset with drama.
Her tour postponement comes not long after the rapper quit social media, following a slew of abuse from fellow rapper Azealia Banks.
In one infamous tweet, Banks coined a racist nickname for Azalea and criticised her for not speaking on black issues.
"Its funny to see people Like Igloo Australia silent when these things happen... Black Culture is cool, but black issues sure aren't huh?" Banks tweeted.
Azalea also complained of the paparazzo invading her privacy by taking photos of her outside her home, telling the Associated Press it's "disgusting".
This week, Azalea was subjected to another negative online post in the form of a Vine video which shows her rapping unintelligibly.
Her Instagram and Twitter accounts are now run by her management who post pleasant photos of Azalea with even more pleasant captions such as "What's up #sxsw"
So far, her Twitter page is a bit of a yawn and it's easy to miss Azalea's spark, her gumption and her bravery, particularly online.
During the spat with Banks, she never shied away from a fight and instead posted some articulate responses.
"You created your own unfortunate situation by being a bigot and don't have the mental capacity to realize yet. Probably never will," she tweeted, in response to Banks attack.
It was that fiery nature that helped push her to the top of rap/hip-hop, a notoriously male-dominated genre.
But somehow, it seems, she's lost a little of her firepower.
However, in the final paragraph of the LA Times review, the reporter saw something of the old Iggy rise to the surface.
"But then, right before the end of the show, she tore into `Iggy SZN,' a delightfully bratty kiss-off, with the kind of intensity she'd seemed incapable of summoning until that point," Wood wrote.
Billboard also saw some of the rapper's strengths shine through in their review of her SXSW performance.
"Azalea was assured and nimble, spitting her guest verses for Ariana's `Problem' and J. Lo's `Booty' remix with fresh fire," the Billboard review read.
So the old Iggy is still in there, somewhere. But the question is, can she surface in time for her tour?
Here's hoping because, let's face it, life is more interesting when Iggy's around.
