Magazine - Sweetheart Contract 12”

1980’s The Correct Use Of Soap had gotten off to a somewhat poor start when lead single “A Song From Under The Floorboards” had been a commercial failure in spite of being an excellent song that seemed to move the band back in the direction they had explored on their more successful first album Real Life. Magazine followed that single up with a bizarre cover of the soul/funk classic “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin) that deconstructed the song and transformed it into a languid and chilly post-punk version. This single also failed to gain much of an audience other than (strangely) as a minor dance/club hit in the US. For a third single Magazine released “Sweetheart Contract”, a tense but quirky song that married the dark and dramatic post-punk sound they had helped to pioneer with the nervous, jerky energy of early new wave. “Sweetheart Contract” is a fun and frisky single that seems made to find success (at least in the UK) but for whatever reason the song didn’t find a large audience, peaking at #54 on the UK singles chart. The lack of commercial success combined with the less guitar-oriented direction of Magazine’s newer music meant that guitarist John McGeoch decided to jump ship and leave when Siouxsie & The Banshees recruited him to be their new guitarist.

Ripped my My Vinyl Dreams to MP3

A1 Sweetheart Contract 3:18
A2 Feed the Enemy (live) 3:45
B1 Twenty Years Ago (live) 3:00
B2 Shot by Both Sides (live) 4:27