Meat Is Murder

Meat Is Murder is the second studio album by the English rock band the Smiths. It was released on 11 February 1985 by Rough Trade Records and became the band's sole number one album in the UK charts during the band's lifetime, staying on the chart for thirteen weeks. The album reached number 40 in Canada and number 110 in the US.

Writing and recording

After the relative production disappointment of the band's 1984 debut album The Smiths, singer Morrissey and guitarist Johnny Marr produced the album themselves, assisted only by engineer Stephen Street, whom they had first met on the session for "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now" and requested the contact number of. Officially, the record's production is credited to "The Smiths", with Rourke and Joyce allowed say about their instruments' sound-levels in the mixing.

Meat Is Murder was more strident and political than its predecessor, including the pro-vegetarian title track (Morrissey forbade the rest of the group from being photographed eating meat), and the anti-corporal punishment "The Headmaster Ritual". Musically, the band had grown more adventurous, with Marr and Rourke channelling rockabilly and funk influences in "Rusholme Ruffians" and "Barbarism Begins at Home".

Meat Is Murder (book)

Meat Is Murder: An Illustrated Guide To Cannibal Culture is a book originally published in 1998, which examines cannibalism in myth, true crime, and film.

Description

The author of Meat Is Murder!, Mikita Brottman received her Ph.D. in English Language and Literature from Oxford University, taught Comparative Literature at Indiana University as a Visiting Assistant Professor, served as a professor at Shippensburg University of Pennsylvania, and is currently on the staff of the Pacifica Graduate Institute. Brottman's writings on film and film culture have appeared in Film Quarterly, Literature Film Quarterly and indieWire, where she regularly covers international film festivals.Meat is Murder! is the eighth volume in Creation Books' series on extreme cinema. The book deals not only with film portrayals of cannibalism, but also with societal and historical aspects of the phenomenon. One of Brottman's points in the study is that recounting stories of the horror of the cannibalism taboo—whether through myth, fairy tale, true crime or film—actually strengthens our communal ties.