TV on the Radio and Portishead Battle It Out for Album of the Year

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Perhaps you aren’t aware of it, but deep in the trenches of music criticism, there’s a war being fought. With only a month and a half left in 2008, nerds around the world will soon be forced to choose an Album of the Year, and there are two major contenders: Portishead’s Third, an utterly bleak comeback album that makes the band’s earlier work look like High School Musical, and TV on the Radio’s Dear Science, a step forward for a band of Gloomy Gusses who suddenly seem almost optimistic. In the interest of helping music critics and music-critic-wannabes, here’s a helpful graph comparing different aspects of the two albums.

mojo-chart-portisheadvstvotr.jpg

Result: 7-7 TIE! See why this is hard?

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A full one-third of our annual fundraising comes in this month alone. That’s risky, because a strong December means our newsroom is on the beat and reporting at full strength—but a weak one means budget cuts and hard choices ahead.

With only days left until December 31, we've raised about half of our $400,000 goal—but we need a huge surge in reader support to close the remaining gap. Whether you've given before or this is your first time, your contribution right now matters.

Managing an independent, nonprofit newsroom is staggeringly hard. There’s no cushion in our budget—no backup revenue, no corporate safety net. We can’t afford to fall short, and we can’t rely on corporations or deep-pocketed interests to fund the fierce, investigative journalism Mother Jones exists to do. That’s why we need you right now. Please chip in to help close the gap.

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