March 7, 2008

Friday Top Five: Beach House, 3Face, McLaughlin Grooves?

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1. Beach House – “Gila” (mp3 at The Line of Best Fit)
Turns out Baltimore doesn’t just make thuddy syncopated club tunes with SpongeBob samples, it also boasts Velvet Underground-y duo Beach House, and this tune from their excellent new album Devotion is both delicate and dark.

2. 3face – “Different World” (All Star Remix) (buy it at iTunes)
Amazingly, the sped-up Four Tops sample isn’t even the best thing about this new grime number from the London MC: it’s the propulsive, ringing chords that push the verses along, urgent and hypnotic.

3. Andrew WK – “McLaughlin Groove” (listen at the Fair Game site)
Wow: turns out Andrew WK’s bloody, raucous throwdowns fit right in with the long-running political talk show’s bloody, raucous throwdowns. My mind is blown.

4. Duffy – “Mercy” (mp3 at Fluxblog)
As Amy Winehouse is to ’60s soul, or maybe more like Lily Allen is to ’80s ska, Duffy is the cute, young, Welsh take on the blues, and it’s actually better than that sounds. (See also Dunproofin’s bouncy remix)

5. Various Artists – Mad Decent Podcast #25: Niche House (download for free at iTunes)
Contrary to the situation here in the states (as I desribed in my post on Friday), in the UK, dance music and hip-hop have been best buds for ages, and the new, speedy genre of “niche” or “bassline” house is their latest mutant stepchild. Get an 18-track introduction to the style from the astoundingly-named Faggatronix DJ crew.

Photos courtesy Carpark Records, Gold Seal Recordings, Island Records, and Mad Decent Records.

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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.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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