Pineapple Express Ad Propels M.I.A. Into Top 40

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You’ve seen the ads (if not, click “play” above). The latest Seth Rogen/Judd Apatow adventure, this time with a slightly darker sensibility, is called Pineapple Express. From the commercials, it looks to be some sort of tale about drugs or witnessing a drug-related murder or being on the run from thugs who saw you witnessing the murder, or something. But apparently nobody’s paying attention to the images, they’re only listening to the music: most of the spot is soundtracked by M.I.A.’s “Paper Planes,” a Clash-sampling and Wreckx N Effect-referencing track from last year’s Kala, and based on this exposure alone, the song has rocketed up the charts. It’s up to #4 on iTunes today, and based almost entirely on these online sales, it broke into the official Billboard charts, climbing to #36 this week. Holy moley, M.I.A.’s Top 40!

After the jump: is it just cause you’re all baked?

Idolator already noticed the song’s burgeoning popularity last week, and they note that despite M.I.A.’s critical acclaim, her music has had, until now, little chart success. Their theory is that, in keeping with Pineapple Express‘ drug theme, the prominently-featured “get high like planes” line is what’s attracting our nation’s stoners to click “buy song” on iTunes. Idolator may be partially right. But more than anything, the song just sounds amazing coming out of the TV, even to those of us who have already spent a lot of time with Kala. Could it possibly be that simple: when good music gets exposed to a wider audience, they might actually like it? After years in the music industry, most of the naive romantic has been beaten out of me, but this development sparks just a little bit of hope.

Pineapple Express, if you’re interested, is out Wednesday, August 6. Here’s the video for “Paper Planes.”

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

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