Welcome to the 17th episode of the CROSSED CHANNELS podcast — a.k.a. the podcast in which music journalists/obsessives Dan Epstein (the Yank) and Tony Fletcher (the Brit) clash and connect over music from either side of the pond.
This time out, our subject is The Smiths, the most iconic British indie band of the 1980s. Specifically, we discuss the period bookended by the August 1984 release of their fifth UK single, “William, It Was Really Nothing,” and the conclusion of their first US tour at the end of June 1985. During that frantic 11-month stretch, the band released the odds n’ sods collection Hatful of Hollow and their second studio album Meat Is Murder, and their epic B-side “How Soon Is Now?” became a massive underground hit in America, thanks in part to a video that Sire Records commissioned and released without the band’s awareness or permission.
Meat Is Murder, the first Smiths album released domestically in the US, reached #110 on the Billboard 200 in May 1985 — which, while not quite as impressive a feat as knocking Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the USA off the top of the UK charts, was still a damn fine showing for a band that had only played one US concert date (New Year’s Eve 1983 at Danceteria in NYC) prior to its release. The record stayed on the US album charts for 32 weeks in all; and on June 7th of that year, Morrissey, Johnny Marr, Andy Rourke and Mike Joyce kicked off their first US tour with a show at Chicago’s 5,000-capacity Aragon Ballroom.
Although Dan was living in Chicago at the time, he happily passed on attending that now-fabled Aragon show. By his own admission, he spent many years stubbornly resisting the charms of The Smiths — so much so, in fact, that he somehow managed to avoid hearing almost all of Meat Is Murder until just a few weeks ago when he began prepping for this episode.
Tony, on the other hand, is exceedingly familiar with the album, as well as the rest of The Smiths’ densely-packed catalog. Not only was he lucky enough to witness the band (which acrimoniously fell apart in 1987) play live on numerous occasions, but he also penned the excellent 2012 biography A Light That Never Goes Out: The Enduring Saga of The Smiths.
Please join us for an animated discussion on a legendary band. Why did such a quintessentially English act resonate so deeply with American audiences? Does Meat Is Murder still hold up for Tony forty years later? Will the album help Dan to finally see the light (that never goes out) and inspire him to delve deeper into The Smiths’ discography? And how come Slim Whitman and Gordon Lightfoot both come up in the conversation? Tune in to find out!
As always, this full CROSSED CHANNELS episode is only available to paid subscribers of Jagged Time Lapse and/or Tony Fletcher, Wordsmith, though a short preview of the episode is available above for all to listen to. To hear this episode in full, along with all of our previous CROSSED CHANNELS episodes, just sign up for a paid subscription to one of our Substacks — or, better yet, sign up for both of them! CROSSED CHANNELS can be heard both here on our Substack pages or via your preferred podcast app: just follow the links and instructions on the right. In addition to the podcast, Jagged Time Lapse and Tony Fletcher, Wordsmith regularly serve up previously unpublished interviews and other exclusive content to our paid subscribers.
