IT WAS THE BIGGEST COCK YOU'D EVER SEEN
― ilxor, Monday, March 23, 2009 3:54 AM (2 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
BUT YOU'VE NO IDEA WHERE THAT COCK HAS BEEN
― ilxor, Monday, March 23, 2009 3:55 AM (2 years ago) Bookmark
ILXOR got there before me
― Lophar Andreusz DeLeone (admrl), Monday, 22 August 2011 15:43 (twelve years ago) link
"In 1984 I was hospitalized for approaching perfection." - Silver Jews, American Water― Famous Athlete, Monday, June 23, 2003 9:54 PM (8 years ago) Bookmark
― Lophar Andreusz DeLeone (admrl), Monday, 22 August 2011 15:45 (twelve years ago) link
You surely are a truly gifted kidBut you're only good asThe last great thing you didAnd where've you been since thenDid the schedule get you down?I hear you've got a new girlfriendHow's the wife taking it?
prefab sprout / moving the river
― piscesx, Friday, 9 August 2013 15:30 (ten years ago) link
Babs and Clean Willie were in love they said So in love the preacher's face turned red
― soref, Saturday, 1 March 2014 21:18 (ten years ago) link
I kind of have mixed feelings about 'Haitian Divorce', but that is such a fantastic opening line in how it gets across an idea of these two characters and their relationship in such a concise fashion and how it suggests this image without going into much detail
― soref, Saturday, 1 March 2014 21:20 (ten years ago) link
like, I can picture these two people getting married, shooting each other looks and sniggering, touching each other in front of this silently indignant minister. enjoying being the centre of attention and the idea of what being at the centre of conversation means in their relationship
― soref, Saturday, 1 March 2014 21:37 (ten years ago) link
that's a tape,that we made…but i'm sad to say it never made the grade…that was me!third guitar…i wonder… where the others… are…i sold the guitar today…i never did play much anyway…
"vine street" by randy newman but im talking VDP here -> song cycle
― i also enjoy in line skateing (spazzmatazz), Saturday, 1 March 2014 23:32 (ten years ago) link
penny lane, there is a barber showing photographs,of every head he's had the pleasure to know,and all the people that come and go,stop and say hello
― i also enjoy in line skateing (spazzmatazz), Sunday, 2 March 2014 02:00 (ten years ago) link
― Lophar Andreusz DeLeone (admrl), Monday, August 22, 2011 11:45 AM (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― reggie (qualmsley), Sunday, 2 March 2014 03:02 (ten years ago) link
"I dreamed about a reefer five feet long"
― Mr. Snrub, Sunday, 2 March 2014 03:33 (ten years ago) link
I triedbut I could not find a way
― Bryan Fairy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 2 March 2014 03:34 (ten years ago) link
When your world is full of strange arrangementsAnd gravity won't pull you throughYou know you're missing out on somethingWell that something depends on you
I'll have a shower And then phone my brother up Within the hour I'll smash another cup
― Kitchen Person, Sunday, 2 March 2014 05:33 (ten years ago) link
"When I was back there in seminary school There was a person there Who put forth the proposition That you can petition the Lord with prayer Petition the lord with prayer Petition the lord with prayer You cannot petition the lord with prayer!"
The Doors - Soft Parade
― bodacious ignoramus, Sunday, 2 March 2014 06:54 (ten years ago) link
I used to wake and run with the moonI lived like a rake and a young man
― charlie h, Sunday, 2 March 2014 13:30 (ten years ago) link
Out of town, my work takes me out of town.I empty villages, I burn their houses down.I set up factories, lay out plantations,And bring prosperity to the poorer nations.
― emil.y, Sunday, 2 March 2014 13:51 (ten years ago) link
ha this thread starts with a misquote of that Meat Puppets lyric
― I got the glares, the mutterings, the snarls (President Keyes), Sunday, 2 March 2014 15:10 (ten years ago) link
a lot of these are frankly more like opening verses
― my collages, let me show you them (bernard snowy), Sunday, 2 March 2014 15:22 (ten years ago) link
A single opening line is one thing, opening lines is another. I guess it depends on if you read the question as 'what are the best lines that open a song' or 'I want multiple people to give me their favourite line that opens a song'.
― emil.y, Sunday, 2 March 2014 15:34 (ten years ago) link
This may be a poetry-reader's bias, but when I think of 'great opening lines' I tend to focus on the fragmentary or obviously incomplete lines that put the listener in suspense from the get-go. Obviously this metric tends to favor storytelling songwriters ("After three nights in jail..." is a personal favorite for its economy, along with "Maybe we could break your ankle, clean & un-suspiciously?") but straightforward pop lyrics benefit just as much from a compressed opening: "I used to say 'I love you...'" — "Rally up my friends & stand by my bedside!" — "I'm never going back to Jackson."
― my collages, let me show you them (bernard snowy), Sunday, 2 March 2014 15:49 (ten years ago) link
I don't necessarily disagree, but equally would point out that that's your focus, and some people prefer longer lines that make a more complete picture. Also, I think for a lot of people they're choosing things that have a great instant hook but that also follow up well - mine, I think, would work with your criteria with just the first line (What work? Where? What's happening here? Where's the story going?) but maintains a consistently interesting tone throughout.
― emil.y, Sunday, 2 March 2014 15:55 (ten years ago) link
yeah, I dunno, I swear I don't *want to* be difficult, it's just that I have a different mental filing cabinet for "songs that open with a string of good lines, each building on the one(s) that came before" and I would put your example (which I am actually not familiar with so who cares what I think really) there, alongside something like this perfectly-paced Silver Jews throwaway I recently rediscovered
― my collages, let me show you them (bernard snowy), Sunday, 2 March 2014 16:02 (ten years ago) link
MC5 win this forever, right?
― Josh in Chicago, Sunday, 2 March 2014 16:45 (ten years ago) link
Outside another yellow moon has punched a hole in the night-time mist.
- Tom Waits - Downtown Train
― Moka, Sunday, 2 March 2014 17:41 (ten years ago) link
"Ain't thou watchin' my film"
― brimstead, Sunday, 2 March 2014 18:14 (ten years ago) link
i'm with bernard, i guess, but it's apples and oranges.
― brimstead, Sunday, 2 March 2014 18:15 (ten years ago) link
"it's so hard... somebody's gonna be evicted"
― brimstead, Wednesday, 26 March 2014 03:02 (ten years ago) link
argh i think i mean that somebody's GOTTA be evicted
― brimstead, Wednesday, 26 March 2014 03:04 (ten years ago) link
from eno's "no one receiving":
"It will shine and it will shudder as I guide it with my rudder"
so awesome
― brimstead, Thursday, 24 April 2014 01:57 (ten years ago) link
i guess i'm thinking of this in terms of the opening lines of *albums*, like, lines that really set a tone or somehow leave you in awe from the get go.
― brimstead, Thursday, 24 April 2014 01:59 (ten years ago) link
Belligerent ghouls run Manchester schools
― flappy bird, Monday, 31 July 2017 07:06 (six years ago) link
My first name Angelene,prettiest mess you've ever seen
― Week of Wonders (Ross), Tuesday, 1 August 2017 17:23 (six years ago) link
All of your friends are cuntsand your mother was a ballpoint pen thief
― The Anti-Climax Blues Band (Turrican), Tuesday, 1 August 2017 17:37 (six years ago) link
*was=is
― The Anti-Climax Blues Band (Turrican), Tuesday, 1 August 2017 17:38 (six years ago) link
Why would you run ?I beg stars aboveA thing of such beautyMust be called love
― Ich bin kein Berliner (alex in mainhattan), Tuesday, 1 August 2017 18:21 (six years ago) link
I am an American aquarium drinkerI assassin down the lineI'm hiding out in the big city blinkingWhat was I thinking when I let go of you?
― Ich bin kein Berliner (alex in mainhattan), Tuesday, 1 August 2017 18:30 (six years ago) link
backwater -- we're sailing at the edges of time
― reggie (qualmsley), Tuesday, 1 August 2017 20:13 (six years ago) link
"won't say I love you, babe"
(Won't say I need you, babeBut I'm gonna get you, babeAnd I will not do you wrong)
From "to live is to fly" by tvz
I don't get it but it's remarkable anyway.
― fuiud, mac (rip van wanko), Friday, 8 December 2017 21:35 (six years ago) link
Got a wife and kids in Baltimore, Jack I went out for a ride and I never went back
― kornrulez6969, Saturday, 9 December 2017 05:43 (six years ago) link
who is Jack?
― niels, Saturday, 9 December 2017 21:14 (six years ago) link
Jack Palance
― kornrulez6969, Monday, 11 December 2017 03:48 (six years ago) link
I was born the day they shot JFK,the way you look at me sucks me down the sidewalk,somebody please tell this machine I'm not a machine
― In a slipshod style (Ross), Monday, 11 December 2017 04:35 (six years ago) link
Ahhh....
I love the colorful clothes she wears
― never have i been a blue calm sea (collardio gelatinous), Monday, 11 December 2017 07:11 (six years ago) link
^ yup
― In a slipshod style (Ross), Monday, 11 December 2017 07:12 (six years ago) link
I always assumed Jack was shorthand for a state or smth, like Memphis, Tennessee, but I guess that doesn't make any sense, and instead the opening line is setting the scene of the song as a dialogue between narrator and interlocutor Jack?
can't help but feel this is lazy songwriting, that Jack is only there for the rhyme
the next line is all killer though
― niels, Monday, 11 December 2017 07:18 (six years ago) link
He is not your run of the mill garden variety Alabama country fare
― flappy bird, Monday, 11 December 2017 07:41 (six years ago) link
every night i tell myself i am the cosmosi am the windbut that don't get you back again
― cwkiii, Thursday, 28 May 2020 13:06 (four years ago) link
Feels like I've been through a washing machine
― frogbs, Tuesday, 18 October 2022 03:51 (one year ago) link
There were 87 Advil in the bottle now there's 30 left, I ate 47 so what happened to the other 10?
it's not music but the opening line to Forrest McNeil's Review is one of the best:
"Life...it's literally all we have. But is it any good?"
― frogbs, Tuesday, 18 October 2022 03:57 (one year ago) link
Son, I'm 30I only went with your mother 'cause she's dirty
― as a lyricist he is from hell (flamboyant goon tie included), Wednesday, 15 November 2023 22:38 (seven months ago) link