Magazine @ The Forum
February 12 2009 @ The Forum, London.
The newly-rebranded HMV Forum's promotional blurb asserts the 'enduringly credible' Magazine 'have always been the connoisseur's choice'. Aside from the crowd looking like they've had much time to enjoy many a fine matured band (the average age is approaching fifty), can a reform almost thirty years after making a record have credibility?
Before commanding the stage, Howard Devoto – recognising a certain self-indulgence – offers a multitude of possible excuses for the gig, ending with a quip that the real reason was he 'needed to impress a girl'. In reality, as they launch into 'The Light Pours Out of Me', the anticipation is so high, you could almost imagine no time has passed at all. Indeed, I strongly suspect much of the audience was there first time round. They pull off a perfectly enjoyable rendition of 'Model Worker' from 'The Correct Use of Soap'; its line 'I have been indulging in ostentatious display' resonates this evening.
Does this gig need something more to move it away from ostentation? Magazine have an arsenal of catchy, influential songs and a cult following - but what would all that mean to the casual fan? I couldn't find one to ask. Certainly nobody was expecting fresh new material – and there was none. It was a fun touch to have Rosalie from the support act, Ipso Facto, sing on 'The Great Beautician in the Sky', nonchalantly taking a chair and feigning reading a magazine between her vocal parts. Ipso Facto deserve more of a mention than that. Clearly very big fans themselves, they looked confident performing to an audience that could hardly have heard of them. I'd have happily listened to more than the six songs they played.
After storming through 'Because You're Frightened' (the audience is moving now, with arthritic vigour), there is a slightly sombre moment as the band remind us of their missing member, guitarist John McGeoch, who died back in 2004. It's a necessary and slightly awkward moment, with many in the audience unsure whether to politely applaud or hang their head in respectful silence. With this done, the band play 'You Never Knew Me', one of their more affecting songs ('I can't be cancelled out like this/ We had to kill too much/ before we could even kiss'), again with vocal backing from Ipso Facto.
The mood is lifted with the next few songs – including crowd-pleasing 'Rhythm of Cruelty', 'Song from Under the Floorboards' and 'Permafrost'. The band look like they're enjoying themselves now and suddenly everything feels very current. It strikes me as odd that there's nobody of a younger generation here. Elements from these songs have found their way into many other bands' recordings over the years and they've been name-dropped by the likes of Radiohead, Morrissey, Jarvis Cocker and, erm, U2 (I didn't realise U2 had ever listened to anything other than U2; well, you live and learn). 'Motorcade', which closes their first encore (yes – there were two encores, 'cos that's ok when you're old and haven't played for almost thirty years), could easily have been released this decade. Damn it, they deserve to be trendy – listen to 'em kids.