Magazine
View on Discogs
View on Wikipedia
Album Summary
Magazine was Heart's second studio album, released in 1977 on Mushroom Records, and honey, the story behind this record is just as dramatic as the music on it. The band — anchored by the incomparable Ann and Nancy Wilson — was deep in a legal battle with Mushroom, trying to break free and move on to Portrait Records when the label went ahead and put this thing out largely without the band's blessing. Mushroom compiled these recordings and pushed them into the world against Heart's wishes, making Magazine one of the most controversial releases of that entire decade. The sessions captured the raw, powerful blend of hard rock grit and folk-rock tenderness that Ann and Nancy had been sculpting into something truly special, even if the band never got to shape the final product the way they deserved.
Reception
- Despite the stormy circumstances surrounding its release, Magazine climbed into the top 20 on the Billboard 200, a testament to how deeply Heart had already connected with their audience following their debut — fans were hungry, and they showed up.
- Critical reception came in mixed, with more than a few reviewers picking up on the uneven feel of the album, a direct reflection of its troubled and disputed origins, though Ann Wilson's voice — that force of nature — drew unanimous reverence from even the harshest critics.
- The legal battle between Heart and Mushroom Records commanded nearly as much press attention as the music itself, casting a long shadow over the album's chart run and making it impossible to separate the art from the controversy.
Significance
- Magazine stands as one of the most striking examples of the label-versus-artist power struggle that defined the 1970s music industry, a real-world illustration of how a record label could seize control of an artist's work during an era when contracts were iron cages and artists had precious little recourse.
- In spite of everything working against it, Magazine helped solidify Heart's standing as one of the most vital and powerful female-fronted rock acts of their generation, expanding their fanbase at a pivotal moment when classic rock was at the very height of its cultural dominance.
- The circumstances surrounding Magazine contributed meaningfully to the growing conversation about artist rights and creative ownership in the late 1970s, a dialogue that would reshape the music industry's relationship with its talent in the years that followed.
Tracklist
-
A1 Heartless 131
4:59
-
A2 Devil Delight 124
4:58
-
A3 Just The Wine 97
4:15
-
A4 Without You 123
4:43
-
B1 Magazine 135
6:19
-
B2 Here Song 154
1:34
-
B3 Mother Earth Blues 132
5:42
-
B4 I've Got The Music In Me 119
6:01
Artist Details
Heart is a rock powerhouse born out of Seattle, Washington in the early 1970s, led by the Wilson sisters — Ann and Nancy — who blazed a trail as women fronting a hard rock band at a time when the genre was almost exclusively a boys' club, blending heavy guitar riffs with folk-tinged balladry and Ann's absolutely volcanic vocal range to create something the world had never quite heard before. Albums like Dreamboat Annie and Little Queen put them on the map in the mid-70s, and their influence stretched all the way into the arena rock era of the 80s, proving they weren't just a moment but a movement. Heart stands as one of the most significant acts in rock history, not only for the sheer quality of their music but for shattering barriers and showing the world that women could command a stage with the same fire and authority as anyone who ever picked up a Gibson.
