So it seems L.A. Record throws a party every single time they release a new issue. Fine with us. Not only does little rag provide excellent local music coverage, their staff makes for good drinking buddies. We attended the latest celebration last night at Cha Cha Lounge in Silverlake.

L.A. Record grand poobahs Chris Ziegler and Charlie Rose

Golden Animals bandmates Tommy Eisner and Linda Beecroft

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It’s been a fabulous week of drama and intrigue and — this being LA — the hopes of well-televised racial violence at the conclusion of a controversial hate-crime case (alas, media blood lust goes unsated).

Here’s a little Friday evening sample platter of news. It comes free during happy hour, so indulge!

Jumping Ship: Ever since the Village Voice Media bought the OC Weekly last year, the staff has gotten mighty unhappy. And now everyone is fleeing — founding editor Will Swaim resigned this week. As did Chris Ziegler and Commie Girl (aka Rebecca Schoenkopf). Read all about it in her final column. As she says, it could have been worse: Singleton coulda bought them. But apparently not-the-worst wasn’t good enough.

Sahara For All The Trouble: Billionaire Philip Anschutz is suing author Clive Cussler, saying the author tricked him into paying $10 million for film rights to the novel Sahara — a development that’s far more interesting than anything Cussler has ever written.

LAT Editors Learn About That Series of Tubes We Like To Play With: Courtesy of LA Observed, LAT Innovation Editor Russ Stanton sends out a memo inviting Times editors to a class “designed to better familiarize you with latimes.com, what generates the most traffic and the least, what the site can and can’t do, and where it is headed.” We love the implicit admission in this that LAT eds don’t even know what’s on the site.