MAGAZINE (ABO #368)

MAGAZINE
SOUNDS FOR SORE EARS

Formed by ex-Buzzcocks' Howard Devoto, Magazine is, with Wire, the band which created the whole post-punk movement. Allying the energy of English punk rock to the aesthetics originating from the art-rock scene, they managed to add brains to the testosterone-infused brutality of punk.
Throughout three outstanding albums - from 1978's Real Life to 1980's The Correct Use of Soap - they perfected a sound that still influences many of today's bands. Sadly, a final album (1981's Magic, Murder and the Weather) saw a major loss in inspiration and their quick demise. Though the latter wasn't a bad album, it was nothing like its three predecessors adding too many keyboards to the mix and losing most of the original energy which inhabited the band.
Magazine recently came back together, minus John McGeogh – often described as the “new wave Jimmy Page” - who died in 2005, and there is word that a new album might be in the works, until that, enjoy "Sounds for Sore Ears" which might not be of the ear-candy type but still is the demonstration of a supremely talented band at work.

My MAGAZINE List
1 – Real Life (1978)
2 – The Correct Use of Soap (1980)
3 – Secondhand Daylight (1979)
4 – Magic, Murder and the Weather

RIYL:
Wire, Public Image Ltd., The Teardrop Explodes, The Fall

Note: the three videos are from the reformed Magazine.