The Only Magazine I Allow in My House

Yes, this Magazine. One of the things I love most about the group Magazine, is that whenever you run into someone else who also admires their recordings and albums, it is like a breath of fresh air. You automatically know this person can relate to the appreciation of their music with you and quite possibly much more. I am sure there are many other bands who give their admirers the same sense of feeling and understanding, but Magazine was altogether different.

Releasing only 4 studio albums during their short and under appreciated existence during the very later part of the 1970s, the Manchester based Magazine just offered something musically that NO ONE else was offering at the time, before or since. Their music was genre defying, despite being arbitrarily lumped into the Punk and New Wave categories. The guitars of John McGeogh (may he rest in peace - I was fortunate to have met him once after a P.I.L. show in Toronto) was so mesmerizing and entertaining and like a cross between Mick Ronson and David Gilmour. The lyrics of band leader Howard Devoto were like poems from an apocalyptic Oscar Wilde. The bass of Barry Adamson is still of legendary proportions, and went on to provide foundation for Nick Cave's Bad Seeds. The keyboards of Dave Formula rivaled Pink Floyd and Hawkwind in one fell swoop making the piano and organs sound so inspirational and ominous. This was post-punk progressive music that screamed poetic angst, disillusionment & displacement.

Magazine's first album Real Life, was not like a debut album that remains a pinnacle of some band's careers leaving albums that followed unnoticed (Many bands have suffered this fate). Real Life was a remarkable introduction to yet another "new" band to emerge from the UK mid-70s Punk & New Wave explosion. It was very good, very good indeed. More punk sounding than their later albums. The band's first single "Shot By Both Sides" featured no keyboards at all and the guitar-bass-drums punk style helped the song into the UK Top 50. The Hammond B3 organ and quasi-Ska shuffle that opens the album in the song "Definitive Gaze" is very catchy & opens up into a more bountiful sound, complimented by Devoto's sneering vocals. Other classic Magazine songs were initiated on this album - "Shot By Both Sides", "The Great Beautician In The Sky", "The Light Pours Out Of Me".

In my humble opinion, their second album Secondhand Daylight was the perfect musical snapshot of the band at their best with more experimental, synthesizer-based material. A slight lineup change saw new keyboardist Dave Formula join the band too which was essential to this newer experimental style. The ultimate Magazine song resided on this album, the one song that galvanized all their fans - "Permafrost". The lyrics were unforgettable.

Thunder shook loose hail on the outhouse again
today I bumped into you again
I have no idea what you want
but there was something I meant to say

As the day stops dead
at the place where we're lost
I will drug you and fuck you on the permafrost

There's not much that I miss
I'm far too forgetful for that
sugar's sweet some of the time
it's hard to keep some things in mind

As the day stops dead ...

Other songs from Secondhand Daylight, like "Feed The Enemy" (a great instrumental that opens the album), "The Thin Air", "Back To Nature", "Talk To The Body", "Believe That I Understand", "Rhythm Of Cruelty" all fit the same pattern and molded perfectly with each other. The result was their most memorable album for their fans.

The third album, The Correct Use Of Soap, was no toss away either. In fact, it is a perfect followup. Songs like "Song From Under The Floorboards", "Model Worker", "Because You're Frightened" was deemed their most commercially acceptable and successful album. (Unfortunately, none of their albums cracked the Top 100 albums in the USA and they only placed 2 songs in the outer regions of the UK Top 50).

Unlike most of their contemporaries, Magazine were "intelligent". For example, "A Song From Under The Floorboards" introduced me to to Dostoevsky. I had read that the lyrics were an alternate translation of "Notes From The Underground" (sadly the Public Education system and English class never introduced me to such world renowned authors). There was even a Kafka-esque reference in one of the lines. Absolutely brilliant literary words set to song...

I am angry I am ill and I'm as ugly as sin

My irritability keeps me alive and kicking

I know the meaning of life, it doesn't help me a bit

I know beauty and I know a good thing when I see it

This is a song from under the floorboards

This is a song from where the wall is cracked

My force of habit, I am an insect

I have to confess I'm proud as hell of that fact

I know the highest and the best

I accord them all due respect

But the brightest jewel inside of me

Glows with pleasure at my own stupidity

This is a song from under the floorboards

This is a song from where the wall is cracked

My force of habit, I am an insect

I have to confess I'm proud as hell of that fact

I used to make phantoms I could later chase

Images of all that could be desired

Then I got tired of counting all of these blessings

And then I just got tired

This is a song from under the floorboards

This is a song from where the wall is cracked

My force of habit, I am an insect

I have to confess I'm proud as hell of that fact

Most will easily dismiss their final studio album Magic, Murder And The Weather. In fact, I am sure most of the band members and Devoto himself see it as a limp swan song. I, personally, enjoyed this album immensely. My favorite has always been "Suburban Rhonda" followed by "About The Weather" and "Come Alive" with its introductory swirling keyboards. Sure it is not as good as their previous three albums, but good nonetheless.

Also, if you have the urge check out some their B-Sides that have appeared on compilations released since and as well on the 2007 remasters of their Virgin catalogue. Worth listening to is their send up of Captain Beefheart's "I Love You You Big Dummy".

The influences this band left are incredibly subtle. Listen to Radiohead and you can hear it. Listen to the Goth bands and you will hear it. God, even Morrissey covered "A Song From Under The Floorboards" (good but not as great as the original).

This is the only Magazine I allow in my house.