March/April 2009

Music: Habeas Corpus

Poli-rock band Living Things offers up a soundtrack for the coming apocalypse.

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The political rock outfit Living Things has crafted a thrilling soundtrack for society’s impending meltdown, tempering the hard-rock roar of its previous effort with a polished sheen while churning up high-octane boogie grooves reminiscent of ZZ Top. Singer Lillian Berlin, one of three brothers in the St. Louis quartet, alternates between anxious whispers and a curdled sneer; in “Snake Oil Man,” he snarls, “War is just murder with a noble name” and warns, “Lock your doors / The Constitution’s gone awol” in “The Kingdom Will Fall.” Even “Let It Rain,” a melancholy power ballad about glory days past and aimed at the mainstream, oozes timely dread.

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

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