Over Easy:Favourite Opening Line
Do you have a favourite opening line from a song?
How about “Please allow me to introduce myself/I’m a man of wealth and taste.”
Or “You’ve got a lot of nerve to say you are my friend.”
I love “Like a bird on a wire/ Like a drunk in a midnight choir.”
You probably remember the effect these brilliant opening lines had when you first heard them. It’s that all important first impression in song. The first two are from The Stones and Dylan, and the last one is from the master, Leonard Cohen, the same man responsible for this Chagall-like image,
“Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin,” the opening to “Dance Me to the End of Love.”
And “They sentenced me to 20 years of boredom,” from “First we Take Manhattan.”
I’ve never heard his thoughts on the subject, but I’m sure Cohen wrote those lines, aware of their boldness and the effect he was looking for. As did the woman who wrote,
“Love came to my door with a sleeping roll/And a madman’s soul”
“The wind is in from Africa/Last night I couldn’t sleep”
From Joni Mitchell’s “Court and Spark” and “Carey”, respectively.
A great opener can be a scene-setter like Kristofferson’s “Me & Bobby McGee”.
“Busted flat in Baton Rouge waitin’ for a train/And I’s feelin’ near as faded as my jeans”
This set the stage for a beautiful, timeless narrative as well as announcing the arrival of a formidable songwriting talent. And it could have been on page 1 of a Larry McMurtry novel.
“I hitched a ride with a vending machine repair man/He says he’s been down this road more than twice.”
It’s mere co-incidence that, by including Sheryl Crow’s “Every Day is a Winding Road”, I’ve offered up a pair of hitch-hiking stories. Or maybe that’s just a perfect invitation to adventure.
They may seem matter-of-fact, but I love the opening lines of “Alfie” by Burt Bacharach and Hal David. “What’s it all about Alfie/Is it just for the moment we live?“ Maybe it’s because it’s an unanswerable question that haunts you through the movie and through the song. They could be the opening lines to a long, late night, end-of-the-bar type of conversation between old friends or people who’d just met. Maybe I particularly admire these wistful words because I know that David had to fit them into Bacharach’s unique piece of music and that it became their favourite song. I also love Hal David’s candour about the process. He said, “Alfie. It’s not a name that spells any romance whatsoever. It sounded almost like a British musical kind of song. It took me a while to find my way into the song, which was the opening line: “What’s it all about?” And, suddenly, I had a sense of where I should go.” (from NPR “Fresh Air” 2012)
Another minimalist gem is the opening of “Just My Imagination”, lyrics by Barrett Strong, who also wrote “I Heard it Through the Grapevine”, “War”, and “Papa was a Rolling Stone”.
“Each day through my window I watch her as she passes by
And I say to myself you’re such a lucky guy”
But something isn’t right here, and we know that he’s not a ‘lucky guy’, and we’re definitely going to stay to see how the story unfolds.
Sometimes a simple declaration can stop the listener cold.
“It’s Britney, bitch.”
Or like this from Prince’s “Sign ‘O’ The Times”.
“In France a skinny man died of a big disease with a little name.”
And if you were wondering if anyone has used the term “interventionist god” in a song,
“I don’t believe in an interventionist god / but I know darling that you do.”
The answer is yes, Nick Cave in “Into My Arms”.
Some images, once heard, are not easily forgotten, like this one from Warren Zevon, a virtuoso of the absurd.
“I saw a werewolf with a Chinese menu in his hand/Walking through the streets of Soho in the rain”
Of course, this is from the man who wrote the song “Things to do in Denver When You’re Dead”.
This opener from The Clash’s ‘Death or Glory” sounds like it’s ripped from the pages of a Raymond Chandler novel.
“Every cheap hood strikes a bargain with the world/Ends up making payments on a sofa or a girl”
Which is the feeling I was going for in writing the opening lines of Amanda Marshall’s song, “Beautiful Goodbye” when I wrote,
“I’m fed up with my destiny/This place of no return
Think I’ll take another day/And slowly watch it burn”
Of course, there should be a caveat that these opening lines are one thing on the page but another when a melody and a particular voice take them up. For me, an example of the perfect marriage of those three elements is “Ode to Billy Joe” by Bobbie Gentry.
“It was the third of June/Another sleepy, dusty, Delta day”
Tell me more.
I made a Spotify playlist to accompany this week’s blog. You’ll find the songs mentioned here along with many more with memorable opening lines. I took the liberty of including one of my own songs!
