Best opening lyric in a song...

As Donna Summer serenades
the creatures of the night
Scott gets his hair just perfect
and turns into the light
then in his red Mercedes
with all his moves down tight
he goes out hunting leopard
in the California night

Dunno, but I'm pretty taken with this at the moment (my italics, but Shakey's own emboldening):

Let's impeach the President for lyin'
And misleading our country into war...

But then I like the other verses too...

Let's impeach the President for spyin'
On citizens inside their own homes...

Let's impeach the President for hyjackin'
Our religion and using it to get elected...

But perhaps it's just me...?

James

a) "I was born in a house with the television always on ...."

b) "Some people say a man is made out of mud .. a poor man's made out of muscle and blood ..."



a)= Talking Heads
b)= Tennessee Ernie Ford

ends==

'I hate myself for loving you and the weakness that it shows
You were just a painted face on a trip down suicide row...'
[even less positive than 4th street]
SJ

I don't know about the best but certainly one of the most eye opening first liners has to be by Regurgitator (Aussie band)

"i sucked a lot of c*ck to get where i am"

song of the same name - actually quite a good song if you like alternative music

they also do a great song called "I like your old stuff better than your new stuff" and "polyester girl" about an inflatable doll

I think they were quite messed up in their early years

ok i'll get my coat now

"if Jesus drove a motor home,
i wonder would he drive
pedal to the metal,
or real slow?
checking out the stereo.
cassette playing Bob Dylan, motivation tapes.
tricked up Winnebago, with the tie dye drapes.
if Jesus drove a motor home......"

"If Jesus Drove a Motor Home" from Jim White's most excellent album, Drill a Hole in that Substate and Tell Me What You See.

PACE

This is as good a place as any for my debut post...

"I woke up in a Soho doorway, a policeman knew my name"

"The milk truck hauls the sun up
The paper hits the door
The subway shakes my floor
And I think about you"

quote:

Originally posted by hungryhalibut:
I really like

Nice girls, not one with a defect,
Picture perfect, so correct,
Red dogs under illegal legs........

Heaven knows what it means, but it's great.

Nigel

Elvis Costello - so hard to make out the lyrics in earlier albums.

---

Nice girls not one with a defect,
cellophane shrink-wrapped, so correct.
Red dogs under illegal legs.

---

SJB

I know John Peel's favourite was "Teenage Kicks" but this is mine:

Now I've got a cousin called Kevin
He's sure to go to heaven
Always spotless clean and neat
The smoothest you can get them
He's got a fur lined sheepskin jacket
My ma said they cost a packet
She won't even let me explain
That me and Kevin were just not the same

I remember seeing them on Top of the Pops at the time and they were hilarious. A bunch of young boys poking and kicking each other churning out this glorious wall of sound.

Hello, I Love You won't you tell me your name

"Today's the fourth of July
Another June has gone by
And when they light up our town I just think
What a waste of gunpowder and sky"

Beautiful. Aimee Mann - 4th of July.

John.

"I was bruised and battered
I couldn't tell what I felt
I was unrecognisable to myself"

or a more contemporary,

"He left a card, a bar of soap
And a scrubbing brush next to a note
That said, Use this down to your bones"

"Son I'm thirty, I only went with your mother 'cos she's dirty"

Cracking opening line from the pen of Shaun Ryder.

Heath

Some girls used to kiss and run
Never knew what they had done
Some girls always wasted time
Keep you hanging on the line
Some loved horses and always stayed at home
But the stainsby girls loved the rolling stones

One from Mr Christy Moore

I dreamt a dream the other night I couldn't sleep a wink
The rats were tryin' to count the sheep and I was off the drink
There were footsteps in the parlour and voices on the stairs
I was climbin' up the walls and movin' round the chairs.
I looked out from under the blanket up at the fireplace.
The Pope and John F. Kennedy were starin' in me face.*
Suddenly it dawned at me I was getting the old D.T.s
When the Child o' Prague began to dance around the mantlepiece.

Delirium Tremens

Shane MacGowan
One summer evening drunk as hell,
I sat there nearly lifeless.
An old man in the corner sang,
Where the water lilies grow.
On the jukebox Johnny sang,
About a thing called love.
And it's "how are you kid? What's your name?
And what do you know?"

A Pair of Brown Eyes

Hank Williams

Now youre lookin at a man thats gettin kind-a mad
I had lots of luck but its all been bad
No matter how I struggle and strive
Ill never get out of this world a-live.

On a romantic note, I offer this from Vincent Damon Furnier

One thing I miss is Cold Ethyl and her skeleton kiss
We met last night making love by the refrigerator light
Ethyl Ethyl let me squeeze you in my arms
Ethyl Ethyl come and freeze me with your charms
One thing. no lie, Ethyl's frigid as an eskimo pie
She's cool in bed
Well she oughta be 'cuz Ethyl's dead

or my favourite song from Vincent Damon Furnier

Well I'm runnin through the world with a gun in my back
Tryin' to catch a ride in a Cadillac
Thought that I was livin'. but you can't really tell
Been tryin' to get away from that success smell
I need a houseboat and I need a plane
I need a butler and a trip to Spain
I need everything the world owes me
I tell that to myself and I agree

I'm caught in a dream = So What!
You don't know what I'm goin' through
I'm right in between = So I'll
I'll just play along with you
.........
When you see me with a smile on my face
Then you'll know I'm a mental case

The Floyd:

One of these days, I'm going to cut you into little pieces

Jethro Tull (not quite PC):

Sitting on a park bench --
Eyeing ittle girls with bad intent.
Snot running down his nose --
Greasy fingers smearing shabby clothes.
Drying in the cold sun --
Watching as the frilly panties run.
Feeling like a dead duck --
Spitting out pieces of his broken luck.
Sun streaking cold --
An old man wandering lonely.
Taking time
The only way he knows.
Leg hurting bad,
As he bends to pick a dog-end --
He goes down to the bog
And warms his feet.

Prince
I guess I shoulda known
By the way u parked your car sideways
That it wouldnt last

Van
Oh, the smell of the bakery from across the street
Got in my nose
As we carried our ladders down the street
With the wrought-iron gate rows
I went home and listened to jimmie rodgers in my lunch-break
Bought five woodbines at the shop on the corner
And went straight back to work.

Leonard Cohen
Well my friends are gone and my hair is grey
I ache in the places where I used to play
And Im crazy for love but Im not coming on
Im just paying my rent every day
Oh in the tower of song

Gather 'round, all you whorey,
Gather 'round, and hear my story.

When a man grows old and his balls grow cold,
And the tip of his prick turns blue;
When it bends in the middle like a one-string fiddle,
He can tell you a tale or two.
So pull up a chair and stand me a drink,
And a tale to you I'll tell
About Dead-Eye Dick and Mexican Pete
And a harlot named Eskimo Nell

I never thought it would happen, with me and the girl from Clapham,
Out on a windy common, that night I ain't forgotten,
Where she dealt out the rations, with some or other passions,
I said you are a lady, perhaps she said, I maybe.

Squeeze - Up the Junction. Pure class.

quote:

Originally posted by Mike1380:
Gather 'round, all you whorey,
Gather 'round, and hear my story.
....

Is that a Cliff Richard song?

From Clem Snide's lead singer Eef Barzelay's "Ballad of Bitter Honey"

"That was my ass you saw bouncin',
Next to Ludicris,
It was only on screen for a second,
But it's kinda hard to miss

And all those other hoochie skanks
They ain't got shit on me
And one of Nelly's bodyguards
He totally agreed."

Cheers,

Bill

How about:

Throw the knife into the stream
run away across the fields
leave me lying where I fell
rivers running out of me.

it's from Tunng's new album "Comments of the Inner Chorus" which is a spectacular album; folktronica is an apt description.

Anna

CSN with:
Forgive me if my fantasies might seem a little shopworn

(Except, until now I thought it was "shot and worn" which is IMHO better than "shopworn")

And Tull with:
I see a daaark saill
On the horiiiizon
Set under a black cloud
That's hiding the sun.

quote:

Originally posted by ROTF:

quote:

Originally posted by Mike1380:
Gather 'round, all you whorey,
Gather 'round, and hear my story.
....

Is that a Cliff Richard song?

Wait for it to rain continuously on Finals day at Wimbledon and find out...