March 17, 2008

SXSW Dispatch: The Show Must Stop

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


strangers.jpgI’m coming back from SXSW sleep-deprived and my ears still ringing. My final hours in Austin went a little something like this:

After catching hip-hop sets from Talib Kweli, Pete Rock, and Jean Grae, I stopped by this outdoor courtyard at dusk to hear local Austin band Combo Mahala play Hawaiian music from the 20s and 30s. A couple in their 50s from England (both wearing cowboy boots) told me they came all the way to SXSW so they could hear bluegrass, country, and Hawaiian music. “The real gems are bands that aren’t even part of SXSW,” the woman told me.

Time for a break from music. I caught a screening of Heavy Metal in Baghdad, a documentary film about the lives of members of Baghdad’s only metal band. The film’s endearing look at a group of friend’s goal to be a band in the middle of a bombed-out war zone also elevates some mind-numbing facts about the lives of Iraqi refugees since the war started. When the group finally enters a Damascus studio to record their first album, it doesn’t matter if you like metal or not; you’re just glad they made it there alive.

Next I caught a Brooklyn “total sonic annihilation” band called A Place To Bury Strangers. Their set closer was more than 10 minutes of sheer noise. I don’t remember the last time I’ve seen so many people cupping their hands over their ears or just walking away from a performing band. The sheer wall of ear-splitting chaos was surreal. Here in Austin, at 12:30 at night, a performance like this felt sublime.

I took a chance and decided to close my last night with a low-volume set from Denver’s Greg Harris Vibe Quintet. Hearing jazz music (fronted by a vibraphone) was a niece reprieve from the slew of noise elsewhere, although a visibly drunk woman dancing around tables and flirting with members of the band (while they were playing) kept things interesting.

“Thank goodness all the freaks are leaving,” A friend said as she pulled up to drop me off at the airport. “But I guess we’ve got a few of them that live here, too.” As I checked in, another friend bid me farewell with the following text message: “Come back, but let the rains clean up this city of mine for a month or so first. ‘Cause as usual this town looks like it has been sh!*t on for the past two weeks. Now back to normal…”

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate