2:34 (album version)
2:41 (single version)
8:58 (extended dance version with "Where Did Our Love Go?" cover)
("30 extended version of "Where Did Our Love Go?" cover) (11:04)

Label

Some Bizzare
Sire/Warner Bros. Records (US)

Writer(s)

Ed Cobb

Producer(s)

Mike Thorne

Soft Cell singles chronology

"Memorabilia"
(1981)

"Tainted Love"
(1981)

"Bedsitter"
(1981)

"Tainted Love"

Single by Marilyn Manson

from the album Not Another Teen Movie soundtrack, The Golden Age of Grotesque

Released

November 2001

Genre

Electro-rock

Length

3:20

Label

Nothing/Interscope/Universal Records

Writer(s)

Ed Cobb

Producer(s)

Marilyn Manson, Tim Sköld

Marilyn Manson singles chronology

"The Nobodies"
(2001)

"Tainted Love"
(2001)

"Mobscene"
(2003)

"Tainted Love" is a song composed by Ed Cobb, formerly of American group the Four Preps, which was originally recorded by Gloria Jones in 1964. It attained worldwide fame after being covered by Soft Cell in 1981 and has since been covered by numerous groups and artists.

American artist Gloria Jones recorded the original version of "Tainted Love", which was written and produced by Ed Cobb. It was the B-side of her 1965 single "My Bad Boy's Comin' Home", which was a commercial flop, failing to chart in either the US or the UK. Before Jones recorded the song, Cobb had offered it to the Standells, whom he managed and produced, but they rejected it.

In 1973, British club DJ Richard Searling purchased a copy of the almost decade-old single while on a trip to the United States. The track's Motown-influenced sound (featuring a fast tempo, horns, electric rhythm guitar and female backing vocals) fit in perfectly with the music favoured by those involved in the UK's Northern Soul club scene of the early 1970s, and Searling popularised the song at the Northern Soul club Va Va’s in Bolton, and later, at Wigan Casino.

Owing to the new-found underground popularity of the song, Jones re-recorded "Tainted Love" in 1976 and released it as a single, but it also failed to chart. This version was released on her album Vixen and was produced by her boyfriend Marc Bolan.

In 2014, NME ranked it number 305 in their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

English vocal-and-synth duo Soft Cell became aware of the song through its status as a UK "Northern Soul" hit, and recorded a drastically different arrangement in 1981. The Soft Cell recording featured a slower tempo than Jones' version, and was in the key of G rather than the original C to match Marc Almond's lower voice. Synthesizers and rhythm machines replaced the original's guitars, bass, drums, and horns. Soft Cell's version was recorded in a day and a half with Almond's first vocal take being used on the record. Producer Mike Thorne commented that he was surprised by the choice as he had not been impressed by the 1976 version on hearing it, but was impressed by the new arrangement and Almond's sinister vocal: "You could smell the coke on that second, Northern Soul version, it was really so over-ramped and so frantic. It was good for the dance floor, but I didn't like the record...when Soft Cell performed the song I heard a very novel sound and a very nice voice, so off we went."

...
Wikipedia