Here’s a free guitar lesson from Johnny Marr in the form of an advertisement for Fender guitars and amps. The former Smiths guitarist uses this 8-minute video to first perform then teach viewers how to play “The Headmaster Ritual,” the iconic opening track to 1985’s Meat is Murder. Watch it right here.

Last September, we gave away a copy of the CD-and-vinyl version of The Smiths’ ‘Complete’ box set to one lucky Slicing Up Eyeballs reader, and now, with the newly remastered albums released individually, the fine folks at Rhino Records have provided us with three copies of the 8-disc CD box set to give away.

This week’s new releases include ‘MMXII,’ the 15th studio album from Killing Joke, plus a reissue of Morrissey’s 1988 solo debut ‘Viva Hate,’ the new 2CD fIREHOSE anthology ‘lowFLOWs,’ a stripped-down version of Elvis Costello’s ‘Spectacular Spinning Songbook’ box set and U.S. editions of The Smiths’ reissues.

This week’s new releases include individual reissues of each album in The Smiths’ catalog, plus MInistry’s first new album in five years (‘Relapse’), the U.K. release of Grinderman’s new remix album (‘Grinderman 2 RMX’) and the U.S. release of Paul Weller’s just-released solo album ‘Sonik Kicks.’

If you didn’t buy The Smiths’ ‘Complete’ box set last year because you’d rather cherry pick which albums to get, you’re in luck: Later this month, Rhino Records will release, in the U.K., standalone CD editions of each title in the set — all four of the band’s studio album, plus three compilations and a live album.

While initially announced as U.K.-only, Rhino Records has decided to release a limited number of The Smiths’ ‘Complete’ box sets in the U.S. exclusively through Rhino.com. Even better: They’ve given us a copy of the deluxe CD-and-vinyl edition to give away to one very lucky Slicing Up Eyeballs reader.

The U.K. arm of Rhino Records this fall will release ‘The Smiths — Complete,’ a ‘super deluxe collectors’ box set’ that will feature remastered versions of the band’s eight albums on both CD and 180-gram audiophile vinyl, plus all 25 of the group’s singles on individual 7-inches.

Janice Whaley is releasing the fruits of her ambitious The Smiths Project — vocal-only covers of all 71 songs The Smiths ever recorded — as a lavish 6CD box set. Fans can pre-order the collection through March 1.

Fans of The Smiths are reveling in an unexpected Christmas gift this week with the appearance of a bootleg LP featuring 16 unreleased studio outtakes, including the scrapped original recording of ‘Sheila Take a Bow,’ a reggae-like take on ‘Girlfriend in a Coma’ and two previously unheard instrumentals.

Today marks the 47th birthday of one of the signature guitarists of his generation: Johnny Marr of The Smiths. In honor of this peerless player, here’s a full ‘Meat is Murder’-era Smiths show, filmed for Spanish television on May 18, 1985, in Madrid.

Record producer and engineer Stephen Street — who worked on three albums by The Smiths before producing and co-writing Morrissey’s solo debut ‘Viva Hate’ — will be the guest on this week’s episode of the ‘Sound Opinions’ radio program, billed as ‘the world’s only rock ‘n’ roll talk show.’

This year may be nearly half over, but it’s certainly not too late to catch up with The Smiths Project, an ambitious and impressive effort by San Jose, Calif., musician Janice Whaley to record layered vocal arrangements of every song ever released by The Smiths — all by the end of 2010.

The Smiths’ classic second album, ‘Meat is Murder,’ was released Feb. 14, 1985 — exactly 25 years ago today. To mark the occasion, we’ve assembled live video of nearly every track on the album (“Well I Wonder” being the missing link).

With Radiohead and Thom Yorke each releasing new songs recently — and Yorke debuting his new solo band, featuring the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Flea […]