album // The Correct Use Of Soap
1980's The Correct Use Of Soap includes many of Magazine's best-loved and familiar tracks, and largely formed the basis for the same year's companion live album, Play. It has a punky edge, but also - thanks to Dave Formula's quirky keyboard melodies - has a pop feel too. Strangely, there's also a sort of soul feel on some tracks, perhaps a result of legendary Manchester producer Martin Hannett's quirky - read unpredictable - production ethics.
'Because You're Frightened' has a restrained, sparse arrangement, hinting at pent-up aggression in a characteristically contrarian Martin Hannett production style; bass, guitar and drums merge together into a motorik, rhythmic whole, only Devoto's arch vocal and Dave Formula's ludicrously twee synths leavening the mood. Entering with some clear, ringing almost ska piano notes, 'Model Worker' poses the question 'While the revoluton lasts / Will it enable me to swallow broken glass?' over a hyperactive rhythm section and almost yobbish backing vocals.
'I'm A Party' is a curious song, featuring falsetto backing vocals, a ska-esque sax breakdown and an extremely soulful vocal from Howard Devoto. Barry Adamson's omnipresent queasy bass effect runs like a turgid stream under the track. In contrast, the largely piano and guitar dominance on 'You Never Knew Me' sees Adamson supplementing the emotional rises and falls of this maudlin song with simple and subtle lines. 'Philadelphia' begins with some spiky guitar and gorgeous keyboards, before launching into a quirky fast-paced rock number, with Devoto spitting insults in the arch manner Magazine fans are accustomed to. The chorus 'Philadelphia / I'm sure that I felt healthier / Maybe it's right to be nervous now', spawning the 2002 title for the latest Magazine retrospective. The track descends into a long instrumental section where John McGeoch's guitar gets increasingly wayward, while the kinetic rhthym section and Formula's dignified keyboard playing remain tightly focused.
The five minute epic 'I Want To Burn Again' begins with Devoto simple accompaniment of acoustic guitars - sounding suspiciously similar to fellow Mancunians Oasis' later 'Married With Children' - before what can only be described as an operatic keyboard from Formula ushers in the main body of the song; Formula's pristine synth lines are here stronly reminiscent of his concurrent work in Visage. Devoto provides a characteristically schizoprenic chorus 'And I still turn to love / I want to burn again'. In a wholly different version from that which appears on Play, the impressive measured cover of Sly And The Family Stone's 'Thank You (Fallettinme Be Mice Elf Again)' manages the impossible task of grafting Devoto's punkish soul vocal onto a sparse backdrop which sees Adamson letting rip with some fiendish licks, with McGeoch provides a semi staccatto guitar accompaniment. 'Sweetheart Contract' is a one of favourite Magazine tracks, with a very melodic bassline and tightly reverbed drums. It has a robotic feel, and Devoto deadpans in a flat style that puts Gary Numan to shame. 'I got insurance / I was dominant for hours' he sings, recalling Colin Newman's treatment of the oft-wry lyrics of Graham Lewis in Wire.
'Sweetheart Contract' is in direct contrast to the punk-funk of 'Stuck' where Adamson and McGeoch get to jam against one another, while Formula drops in incendiary bursts of organ; Devoto's vocal again reaches the aforementioned Newman's emotional style. The album concludes with the perfection that is 'A Song From Under The Floorboards', a classic alternative pop record if ever there was one. Caught in the headlights between devotion and self-deprecation ('I am an insect' Devoto is heard to sing), the track does not conform to any universal formula of pop, but with an upbeat style and keyboard-led gloss, it makes sense as a pop song; it even ends with a jazzy piano jam into the fade. The only fly in the ointment is Hannett's production, which compresses John Doyle's drums into robotic, reverberating patterns.