What are your favourite or most memorable opening lines to a song? I listened to “National Sh*te Day” by Half Man Half biscuit today for the first time in ages and it struck me that I don’t think I’ve ever heard a better opener:

“Pulling the ice axe from my leg, I staggered on, spindrift stinging my remaining eye.”

Makes me smile anyway…. any suggestions folks?

‘i was born in a cross fire hurricane’ Stones jumpin jack flash

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

“masturbation saved my life” by Therapy. Can’t remember which album.

When I woke up this morning, things were lookin’ bad
Seem like total silence was the only friend I had
Bowl of oatmeal tried to stare me down… and won
And it was twelve o’clock before I realized
That I was havin’ .. no fun

Illegal Smile – John Prine

indeed white101.

Always loved ‘One pill makes you larger and one pill makes you small’

and “New York, I Love You
But you’re bringing me down”

she was a fast machine, she kept her motor clean

“I’m a street walking cheetah with a heart full of napalm”

On the first day of March it was raining
It was raining worse than anything that I have ever seen
I drank ten pints of beer and I cursed all the people there
and I wished to God that that all this raining would stop falling down on me.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2M7snEx1zs[/video]

Have you heard Rock n roll is full of bad wools by HFMB marvin? A hymn to the nation in many ways:

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbw6HLqsd7E[/video]

Don’t know about best, but certainly memorable – Plaistrow Patricia by Ian Dury… can’t really type it here due to the naughty filter.. 😉

Plaistrow Patricia

Not heard that HMHB track Garry, cheers. Love Joy Division Oven Gloves too, and Restless Legs.

Hello, good evening, welcome to nothing much
A no holds barred half-nelson and the loving touch
The comfort and the joy of feeling lost
With the only living boy in New Cross

Un dos tres quatro- every Sepultura song ever.

Ah bellerephon, what a first line…

Oh – stop

With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Try this trick and spin it, yeah

First we get some surgery
lose the kids and our identities

I saw a werewolf with a Chinese menu in his hand
Walking through the streets of Soho in the rain
He was looking for a place called Lee Ho ****’s
Gonna get a big dish of beef chow mein

“I’m so drunk”

Not a lyric but the opener to Pay Your Price (I Won’t)

Also, “Stop mincing about”, Jailbait

Unstoppable force and immovable object,
repel one another when by chance colliding.
The Brownian-Motion within this love potion,
ensures our opinions are always dividing.

I don’t wanna’ meet your mom and dad,
Unless you’ll let me fK your mom and dress your dad in drag.

Not strictly a lyric but….

“Good Morning Mr Tyler…Going Down”

or

“There’s a lot of stupid people out there, doing a lot of stupid things”

“masturbation saved my life” by Therapy. Can’t remember which album.

Troublegum

anyway

“where shall we go from here?
is it down to the lake I fear?”

why did he fear the lake?

Haircut 100, Fantastic Day I think.

Another great HMHB opening salvo:

Well my name it is Dai Young
I’m the King of Welsh Goth
The village I come from
Is near Abersoch
I was brought up on Bauhaus
And black bedroom walls
And I had my first Snakebite
When I was in halls

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAuiWmVHd8M[/video]

“She came from Greece she had a thirst for knowledge”
Pulp – Common People

“There’s no quick fix
You gotta take your licks”
Nada Surf – No Quick Fix

“She wore big knickers and she worked at ‘sewage farm.
Got me hands down her jeans and I nearly lost half me arm…”

Macc Lads – Sweaty Betty 😀

In the time of chimpanzees I was a monkey – Loser, Beck

When routine bites hard,
And ambitions are low,
And resentment rides high,
But emotions won’t grow,
And we’re changing our ways,
Taking different roads – Love will tear us apart, Joy Division

She could never ever ever ever ever ever ever get it into her thick head – You fu#@ing Love It, Dirty Pretty Things

Pulp, Feeling Called Love…

The room is cold,
and it’s been like this for several months.
If I close my eyes I can visualise everything in it.
Right down, right down to the broken handle of the third drawer
down of the dressing table.
And the world outside this room has
assumed a familiar shape, the same events shuffled in a slightly
different order each day, just like a modern shopping centre.

He has a powerful weapon….

Back in black
I hit the sack

The Distant Echo
Of Faraway Voices Boarding Faraway Trains
To Take Them Home To
The Wives That They Love And Who Love Them Forever

Or

There must be some kind of way out of here
Said the joker to the thief

Or

I shake my head and shiver
They smile and they stab my back as they shake my hand
Send out an S.O.S please
Come quickly
I’m marooned in Monkeyland

I’ve got something to say
I killed your mother today

I’d go with one of these two:
[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wo29_EjE-1Q[/video]

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hZR1Ye6xg0[/video]

Disclaimer: there are some rather naughty words in the second one.

there’s a spider in the bathtub
a cockroach in the sink
toilet seat is broken
chain hasn’t got a link

the wurzels “there’s a spider in the bathtub” 😀

“Everyday I shit into the sea
its strange but it doesn’t mean much to me
I’m living in a porcelain dream
and things aren’t quite what they seem”

Regurgitator-everyday

I know it’s out of fashion
And a trifle uncool
But i can’t help it
I’m a romantic fool

Martha and the Muffins, Echo Beach

I’m a little pimp with my hair gassed back
Pair a khaki pants with my shoes shined black

FZ

You’re unlovable
And have nothing anyone could possibly want

And by the same band:

Pick a card. Any card.
Wrong…

” i push my fingers into my eyes ” slipnot

I’m in Tokyo; I’m lookin’ for a ho(-oo-oo)
I try to score some blow; but I don’t speak-a Japanese – no

smells like suuushiiiiiii