An interesting article came out on The Boston Globe, July 13-19 edition, 2007. Its title is called "Post-Punk Pantheon", and, citing the list of the 10 albums that helped inaugurate what is now known as "Indie Rock", it curiously had "Meat Is Murder" (Sire 1985) included. Here is what they write, in a quite odd and loony-shakespearean way, about The Smiths and why MIM was chosen, according to them, as a landmark album:

"Abuse! Abuse of sons and daughters, abuse of schoolchildren, abuse of women, abuse of animals, and above all, abuse of Steven Patrick Morrissey - this was the theme of the second album from The Smiths. Education is rot and sadism in 'The Headmaster Ritual', as dastardly pedagogues with cracking-knee joints attack the bodies and minds of their young charges. 'A crack on the head is what you get for asking' in 'Barbarism Begins at Home'. And as for the flesh we so fancifully fry...Moz himself, a rained on Jean-Genet, keeps a covetous eye on the lowlife - fairground greasers, tattooed boys from Birkenhead, cop-killers. But he wants the one he can't have, and finally adjourns to the ice-cave of clinical depression for 'That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore'. Musically, 'Meat Is Murder' is upsy-downsy - very inventive on the one hand (the firestorm skiffle of 'What She Said'), morbidly dated on the other (the lead-footed '80s funk of 'Barbarism Begins At Home'). And the lyric-sheet has its flaws: 'Nowhere Fast' ('I'd like to drop my trousers to the Queen...')is Moz-by-numbers, and flouncing through the veggie anthem of the title track he succumbs- for perhaps the only time in his career-to piety. So it's neither a great Johnny Marr album, nor a great Morrissey album. But as a Smiths album, 'Meat Is Murder' is a life-changer: a fully-loaded syringe of wit and victimhood, aimed at the heart of the world.'

It was written by the Phoenix staff, and I presume they are less than 30 years of age, if age really matters in terms of how the latest generation sees and chooses albums from "the past" to influence them.

And here's the list of the 10 landmark albums so you can agree or disagree to agree with the folks:

1)Dinosaur Jr./Your're Living All Over Me (SST, 1987)
2)Hüsker Dü/Zen Arcade (SST, 1984)
3)Joy Division/Closer (Factory, 1980)
4)The Jesus And Mary Chain/Psychocandy (Warner Bros, 1985)
5)Minutemen/Double Nickels On The Dime (SST, 1984)
6)Pixies/Surfer Rosa (4AD, 1988)
7)R.E.M./Murmur (IRS, 1983)
8)Replacements/Let It Be (Twin/Tone, 1984)
9)The Smiths/Meat Is Murder (Sire, 1985)

They forgot to include the 10th! Oh, well...

The article cited in this post was actually printed in the Phoenix, not the Boston Globe, which to my knowledge doesn't carry a weekly edition (The author notes conflicting accounts of that the article "came out on The Boston Globe, July 13-19 edition, 2007" and later mentions the article was "written by the Phoenix staff").

The article can be accessed online here.

Lastly, the 10th landmark album was included as Sonic Youth, Daydream Nation (Enigma, 1988).