The origins of "The Queen Is Dead" date to a live performance of the band's 1985 song "
Barbarism Begins at Home", where Smiths frontman and lyricist Morrissey ad-libbed the lyrics "the queen is dead", a phrase from the novel
Last Exit to Brooklyn (1964). Morrissey later decided to revisit the phrase for the lyric of a new song. Inspired by the political tone of the lyric, Smiths guitarist
Johnny Marr wrote the music by drawing on
MC5 and
the Velvet Underground's "
I Can't Stand It", a song which had been unreleased by the band until it appeared on an archival compilation in 1985. Marr also developed his guitar line in the studio, manipulating the note of a
harmonic with the angle of his
wah-wah pedal. Morrissey additionally makes
camp references to the double meaning of
queen: as he noted in the press, "There's a safety net in the song that the 'old queen' is me". The song also draws for lyrical inspiration upon the incident when
Michael Fagan trespassed in
Buckingham Palace and encountered Queen
Elizabeth II. According to author Tony Fletcher, the lyric "When you're tied to your mother's apron, no one talks about castration" was a reference to Morrissey's close relationship with his mother when growing up. Per Morrissey's request, the song begins with a snippet of "
Take Me Back to Dear Old Blighty", sung by actress
Cicely Courtneidge in the 1962 film
The L-Shaped Room. At the suggestion of Street, about a minute of the song's jam was cut from the final recording. Originally, the band had planned for the song to
fade out. == Release ==