Magazine - Real Life (1978)

This band and certainly this album get short shrift around these parts. What a great, angular, spiky, art rock album Real Life (1978) is from British post-punk outfit Magazine.

Howard Devoto, ex-Buzzcocks on vocals. Pete Shelley has a couple of co-writes on here and the whole thing still sounds fresh and current.

Barry Adamson (Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds) on bass, produced by John Leckie (XTC, Simple Minds, Human League, The Fall, Stone Roses etc etc) and John McGeoch on guitar (Siouxsie, Visage, PiL).

This album is highly recommended for anyone potentially into this genre. Get hold of this rewarding, influential and somewhat forgotten classic.

 

It's a great album. 'Shot By Both Sides' was one of the best singles of 1978. It had a memorable picture sleeve too..

 

Agreed on all counts, but forgotten? It's in any list about the genre and era.

 

I recall that Shot from Both Sides was reasonably big. I know John Peel played it at the time. If memory serves right, they were labelled as "Power Pop", since they came at the end of punk.

 

Don't forget that the album doesn't contain the definitive version of "Shot By Both Sides". That's only on the single. The band lost the master and had to rerecord it for "Real Life". Which didn't work as well.

Great classic "debut" nevertheless!

 

I didn't know the band had lost the master for the single version. Careless !

 

Far from forgotten. What a cracking album

 

I've been to many great concerts over the years, but my favourite live band were, and remain, Magazine.

I was at college in Manchester, their hometown, during the heyday of Magazine 1978-1981, and they were as big as anything else in the new wave/indie scene in that part of the world, at least until New Order took off. The 'Shot By Both Sides' single is a classic, and better than the re-recorded version on 'Real Life'. The energy of the single was mind-blowing at the time. I saw them a few times during 1979/1980, and those concerts still live with me. Thankfully, one was recorded and a few tracks from that Russell Club performance were officially released. I also saw them for 2009 reunion. Still a class act.

They did struggle to gain wider acceptance. Their mix of high-energy new wave pop and longer-form multi-part songs (almost prog) on the albums and in-concert appeared to frustrate in equal measure those who preferred one or the other song style. I just needed the slow songs to recover in the mosh-pit.

Their albums stand up to being played all the way through, which cannot be said for many of their contemporaries. No doubt those already sold on Magazine will welcome this thread and the discussion about 'Real Life', but it would also be interesting to hear the opinions of listeners new to this album forty years after its release.

 

I'm one of those new listeners, and it ticks all boxes. An exhilarating listen 40 years on.

 

So what master did they use for the 2007 extended 'Real Life' with the bonus single tracks?

 

The sooner I get a hold of that single the better.

 

I think many of the new wave albums around '78 sound far more contemporary than their punk predecessors. If Magazine released this album today it would still sound fresh and exciting.

 

When you get one it's worth turning it over. Magnificent B-side:

 

I was/am a big fan of Magazine. I think some of the albums certainly Real Life have had a recent vinyl release. Sorry I can't remember if the single version of Shot By Both Sides has made it onto official cd. Overall with the small cd box, the remasters and the Peel cd the Magazine catalogue on cd is pretty good. It should all be affordable for folk wishing to buy any.

 

My word. Visage, which appears to utilise the same musicians sounds good. Likewise Rich Kids.

 

Magazine - Real Life

 

Thanks, I have that cd. I take it the tapes of the single were found?

 

'Fade To Grey' is another example of a single that could be released today and still be contemporary.

 

Is this the single non album version? Bear with me I'm new to all things Devoto/Magazine.



What a colossal track either way.

 

Yes.
The original single ends with guitar feedback and organ
The album version has a little rise in the organ at the end.
The drums are much higher in the album recording.
The original has all the hungry energy of a first single.

 

A Hungry energy rarely heralded from anyone, Illuminati notwithstanding

 

I remember playing it for the first time (I had the U.K. cassette) and being disappointed that "Shot...' was a different version, but 'Motorcade' and the wonderful 'The Light Pours Out Of Me' (my favourite) soon made up for it!

 

I actually remember the first time Peel played the single. I think it was the first week of January 1978, and he said something like it’s only the first week of January, and already we have the best single of the year. He wasn’t wrong. I don’t remember them being labelled power pop. Probably post punk.

 

Never understood the Kennedy Assassination theme in the titles...

 

It's one of the greatest songs of all time.