10 Greatest Love Songs On The Magnetic Fields '69 Love Songs'
7. Come Back From San Francisco
Come Back To San Francisco has all the wit and neat rhymes you can find elsewhere on the album. “Come back from San Francisco/And kiss me I’ve quit smoking/I miss doing the wild thing with you”
Sung by Stephin Merritt himself it would risk sounding ironic or detached but instead Shirley Simms aching lead vocal lends the track a beautiful sincerity.
Based around a folk guitar line, this song about a lover gone to San Francisco leaving behind the singer in New York, isn’t fuelled by the heat of jealously but by a sad longing for the beloved to return. “ bags, call cabs and hurry home to me”.