April 21, 2014

Music Review: “Undefeated” by Bobby Bare Jr.’s Young Criminals’ Starvation League

The alt-country singer releases an ambitious hybrid of down-home and epic pop sounds.


Bobby Bare Jr.’s Young Criminals’ Starvation League
Undefeated
Bloodshot

Bobby Bare Jr., the offspring and namesake of one of the greatest country crooners of all time, has forged an intriguing and consistently unpredictable career of his own since the late ’90s, exploring rootsy rock, alt-country, and singer-songwriter styles with witty verve. Undefeated finds the likable troubadour crafting a tantalizing hybrid of down-home and epic pop sounds, and reflecting on romance, betrayal and heartbreak in ambitious yet rough-hewn tracks like “If She Cared,” “My Baby Took My Baby Away”, and “As Forever Became Never Again.” As always, the key is Bare’s ruefully eloquent voice, which finds a humorous undercurrent in the most woeful situations.

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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.

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