My Top Ten Opening Lines (Volume 1)

Something a little bit different this week. I'm not going to tell you the song: you either know it from its opening line or you'll have to click on the link. A great opening line can drag you kicking and screaming into a song and never let you go. It's a hard nut to crack... and it's even harder for an old and permanently befuddled brain to remember all the great opening lines in his record collection (they've not yet invented the search criteria for that)... but these were the ones that occurred to me off the top of my head. Hence why this post is a Volume 1... because I'm sure I'll remember loads I've missed sooner or later and then I can stack up another list further down the line.

And yes, I did seriously consider including "I am a lineman for the county"... but hopefully I got that out of my system last week. For a while, anyway.



10. Wop bop a loo bop a lop bom bom!

Could have been Number One, but I chose to kick off with it instead. In many ways, this is the opening line of popular music itself...

9. Been a whole lot easier since the bitch left town...

OK, considering the caliber of the artists on the rest of the list, including this bunch will no doubt set the cat among the pigeons. (No, it's not Bros.) But anyone who's ever been through a bad break-up will surely nod their head...

No? Just me?

8. In a time of chimpanzees, I was a monkey...

Because we've all felt like this one time or another, right?

7. Bobby said he'd pull out, Bobby stayed in...

The best songs are like short stories, and the best short stories grab your attention from the opening line. There are plenty of examples of that on this particular album (and throughout this particular artist's career), but this is surely the most direct. Start with the sex scene...

6. You look so good when you're depressed... 

or

6. "Rather than you," she said, "I prefer solitude"...

I couldn't decide between them. He's written many a fine lyric, and if I thought about it harder I could probably fill an entire Top Ten with opening lines just from this guy.

5. Only the very young and the very beautiful can be so aloof...

Written after a "bad experience in a gay sauna", apparently.

That'll explain the cheesy sax.

4. I was happy in the haze of a drunken hour...

This line - this entire song - is the reason I (and many others) hated them back in the day. But we just didn't get it. This isn't miserablism - it's laughing through the graveyard of our lives. In that respect, it may we be the most positive song ever written.

3. You painted up your lips and rolled and curled your tinted hair...

Come on. You know you love it. 

2. Pretty women out walking with gorillas down my street...

Beginning with an observation that every lovelorn young male will surely recognise... no wonder this was his biggest hit.

1. I don't believe in an interventionist God...

It only really makes sense when you hear it with the following three lines...

But I know, darling, that you do
But if I did I would kneel down and ask Him
Not to intervene when it came to you

Surely the greatest opening lines to a love song, ever.


Unless you know differently...

My Top Ten Songs For Electricians

Some time ago (well, 2+ years... my, how time flies) when I unveiled My Top Ten Carpentry Songs I fully intended to follow it up with songs devoted to other popular trades. Finally, I decided to have a go at electricians - but I wanted to avoid all the obvious Electric songs (Dreams / Friends / Avenue / Ladyland / Spanking of War Babies etc.) because they'll fit into their own post one day. So here, instead, are ten songs specifically about electricians... or about the things they deal with on a daily basis.

Special mention to Cliff Richard - Wired For Sound which is as close to a guilty pleasure as I get (considering how broad and cheesy these lists do sometimes go). I tried to find room for Sir Cliff here, but in the end I had to admit that it's a song more about speakers (tall ones and small ones - Cliff has no time for midi). The rollerskating video is always worth a look though...

Further special mentions to Elvis and George Harrison, both of whom (according to t'internet) started out as apprentice electricians before more successful careers beckoned...



10. Robert Palmer - I Dream Of Wires

Perhaps I should have gone with Gary Numan's original version, but I was always a huge fan of Bob Palmer's voice and I consider it a tragedy that he died as young as he did because I bet he could have gone on and on... as Numan himself has done.

Anyway, I Dream Of Wires is one of the few songs I know that actually mentions an electrician in its lyrics, though it actually tells of a completely "wireless" future wherein the "last electrician alive" looks back fondly on a world that was a little less alien...

We opened doors by thinking
We went to sleep by dialing 'o'
We drove to work by proxy
I plugged my wife in, just for show

New ways, new ways
I dream of wires

So I press 'c' for comfort
I dream of wires, the old days

Other songs to mention electricians directly include Better Things by Massive Attack & Tracy Thorn  (You say the magic's gone / Well, I'm not a magician / You say the spark's gone / Well get an electrician), Demystification by Zounds (My electronic shaver won't plug into the wall /
Now I can't go to the party, the electrician didn't call) and Nick Cave's amazing Babe, I'm On Fire. Oh, and this...

9. John Parish - Kansas City Electrician

An artist whose solo work I only discovered quite recently, though he's been knocking around for years, working with the likes of PJ Harvey, Eels and Sparklehorse. KCE sounds like classic American alt-rock, so I was surprised to find out that Parish is actually from the UK (Yeovil), though I guess his lyrical slang ("nowt", "that bloke") should have given him away. A great song: made me go out and buy the album.  

8. Muse - Plug In Baby

I have a curious relationship with Muse. I liked their early material very much and even went to see them playing live when they were just starting out (at The Leadmill, I think). Matt Bellamy spent most of the show with his back to the audience... and I never really recovered from that. (Believe it or not, I much preferred the support act. They were called Cold something. Cold...play? No idea what happened to them.)

7. Teenage Fanclub - Sparky's Dream

A cracking single from the Fannies, one of their best. The Byrds have a lot to answer for.

6. Electric Six - Danger! High Voltage

Very silly.

Very.

Very.

Silly.

Good, though.

The video's a work of art.

5. The Wonder Stuff - Change Every Light Bulb

The opening track from what is sometimes my favourite Stuffies album, Construction For The Modern Idiot. Not heard this in ages.

4. Athlete - Wires

A very emotive song, more so when you know that it's about the premature birth of lead Athlete Joel Pott's daughter and the life support system that kept her going.

3. Slaves - Sockets

I haven't made up my mind yet, but Slaves are definite contenders for the best new band of 2015. They've got the snotty punk appeal of early Supergrass, but a little more to say for themselves lyrically. They're just two lads from Kent (Laurie Vincent on guitar / bass and Isaac Holman on drums: they both sing) but they make a hell of a satisfying racket.

On first listen, the Sockets they sing about here appear to be the ones in your head rather than the ones an electrician would fix. The video suggests otherwise...

2. Barenaked Ladies - Light Up My Room

The Barenaked Ladies are a clever band - sometimes a little too clever - but this is the closest they ever got to capturing my heart as well as tickling my funny bone. Here, a whole town is infected with electricity thanks to a nearby Hydrofield (what the Canadians call a bunch of pylons, basically), making every resident into an amateur electrician.

I can put a spare bulb in my hand
And light up my yard...

1. Glen Campbell - Wichita Lineman

Longtime readers of my ramblings may have seen this one coming: but I'll be honest with you, when I started planning this post I hadn't even considered that a lineman was an electrician. Once I'd made the connection, it had to be Number One, for the sheer fact that it is the greatest song ever written (Jimmy Webb Is God) and, though there are many fine versions in existence, no one will ever top Glen's haunting and heartbreaking delivery. I could go on and on about what makes it so special (the way that the melody and the lyrics merge together to create a seamless jewel; the yearning romanticism and evocative imagery; "And I need you more than want you / And I want your for all time") but I've probably said it all elsewhere. Simply put, there is no finer recording and if I could make it Number One every week, I would.




Which one would you get to wire your house (for sound)?

My Top Ten Gene Songs

No, this isn't my Top Ten Songs by the band Gene... although I was tempted, because they were amazing. (And isn't it about time Martin Rossiter released another solo album? The first one was a belter.)

Instead, it's the logical (to me, anyway) conclusion of my Jean / Jeans / Gene trilogy. Most of the songs below are about blokes called Gene or Eugene... a couple of them might be a bit more genetic.

Special mentions to Gene (obviously), Genelab, Geneva, Gene Kelly, Gene Pitney, Gene Watson and... er, Genesis. Plus a number of the gentlemen mentioned below...



10. Foil - Reviver Gene

OK, so it might not be about a bloke called Gene, but it's a forgotten Britpop gem and I wanted to give it a quick play.

Can't find much out about Foil other than that they came from Edinburgh and made a good racket. What else do you need to know?

9. Sufjan Stevens - Eugene

A starkly beautiful cut from Stevens' latest record, the autobiographical Carrie & Lowell.

Emerald Park, wonders never cease
The man who taught me to swim, he couldn't quite say my first name
Like a Father he led community water on my head
And he called me “Subaru”
And now I want to be near you

8. The Monkees - Papa Gene's Blues

Unlike a lot of Monkees songs which were written by other people (including Neil Diamond and Carole King), this is an original Mike Nesmith composition. Nesmith went on to have quite an impressive solo career post-Monkees... I hesitate to say he was the Gary Barlow of his day, because, obviously, he wasn't a wet git.

7. Walter Becker - Selfish Gene

The Steely man who isn't Donald Fagen pokes playful fun at a particular selfish Gene, with typically arch Dan-esque lyrics.

6. Catatonia - My Selfish Gene

Oh, Cerys - such a voice. Heartbreak in every breath.

OK, strictly speaking, this one isn't about a bloke called Gene either... but it is glorious.

5. Teenage Fanclub - Gene Clark

The Fannies pay their dues to Gene Clark, chief songwriter of The Byrds, one of the band's biggest influences. Some fantastic guitar work on this one... ironically, with nary a Byrdsy jangle in sight.

4. Johnny Cash - Daddy, Who's Gene Autry?

To answer Johnny Cash Jr.'s question, his dad reveals that Gene Autry was the singing cowboy... an actor who made almost 100 singing cowboy films between 1934 and 1953. Although he retired in the early 60s, he enjoyed a good old retirement, living until 1998 when he died at the grand age of 91.

Fun fact: the guitar Johnny plays in the video of his gutwrenching version of Hurt was signed by Gene Autry. 

3. Ian Dury & The Blockheads - Sweet Gene Vincent

We discussed Gene Vincent in the Top Ten Jeans Songs - and here's Ian Dury mourning his decline with some Thunderbird wine: possibly the sweetest thing Ian ever recorded... for the first minute twenty... until the rock 'n' roll kicks in. Vincent died in 1971 and has been immortalised in a number of tribute records, including Gene & Eddie by the Stray Cats and Luke Haines' masterful Gene Vincent (Rock 'n' Roll Mums and Rock 'n' Roll Dads).

2. Pink Martini - Hey Eugene

I have to confess that Hey Eugene is the only song I know by Pink Martini - and although it's a cracker, I kinda thought they were one "hit wonders until I did a little digging for this post. Turns out they've released 7 albums since 1997.

Hey Eugene do you remember me?
I'm that chick you danced with two times through the Rufus album Friday night at that party on avenue A:
Where your skinhead friend passed out for several hours on the bathroom floor and you told me
You weren't that drunk, and that I was your favourite Salsa dancer you had ever come across in New York city..

I obviously need to investigate further...

1. Frank Turner - Wherefore Art Thou, Gene Simmons?

As Frank explains in his intro here, he was inspired to write this tribute to the elastic-tongued Kiss frontman after reading his biography and discovering that The Demon (real name Chaim Witz) claims to have slept with 4600 women... and taken a photo of every one. What a... Romeo.

A mother said, "Beware of boys in bands
And certainly don't let them write you songs
For they will come to you on bended knee and kiss your pretty hands
When the singing's done, and the suns up they'll be gone."
While her mother has a point, I might resent the implication.
That every boy who plays guitar plays women like Gene Simmons.

Though, as Frank confesses later in the song, he's not entirely innocent himself...





Which is your Gene Hackman?

My Top Ten Pig Songs

In a change to the advertised Top Ten (we'll get back to Gene songs next week), here's a Top Ten for Number 10. You might call it schadenfreude... I call it just desserts. But then, I'm from Yorkshire, and as Dodgy Dave will tell you... we hate everyone.


10. The Beatles - Piggies

I thought long and hard about whether to include this one. The White Album is my favourite Beatles LP (on the days I don't prefer Abbey Road) and George is my favourite Beatle, so theoretically I should like it. In truth though, the lyrics sound like they've been written by a 6th Former who's read Animal Farm and is just discovering that people are pretty shitty... which is probably why the song was quoted by Charles Manson as justification for the murders of Sharon Tate et al.

In the end, I was swayed to give it a mention by the wag who has added the following line to its iffypedia entry this week...

"This is British Prime Minister David Cameron's favourite Beatles song."

I wonder how long before that gets edited out?

(Plus, Piggies is better than Pink Floyd.)

9. Green Jelly - Three Little Pigs 

What can I say...? I have a soft spot for ludicrous cartoon metal songs based on nursery rhymes, especially when their videos are made out of plasticine. Shoot me.

8. Canned Heat - Sic 'Em, Pigs

Despite being critical of my good friends in the Los Angeles Police Department, this hippie blues boogie from my Best of Canned Heat album wins a place on the chart (beating out fine contenders such as Black Sabbath, Nine Inch Nails, The Cocteau Twins, Jane's Addiction and Nina Simone) because it's the only pig song I own in which the singer performs pig snorts as part of his vocal - pretty authentic ones, too.  

This track was banned by many US radio stations as it ends with a mock recruitment call to join the LAPD in which one of the band reads out the copshop's actual phone number... which is a cool bit of hippy protest nonsense the Dude would be proud of.

7. Elvis Costello & The Brodsky Quartet - Swine

Big Elv's dalliance with "classical" music worked better than expected. Here, he lets the Brodsky Quartet do most of the heavy lifting before going off on what sounds like a typically vicious lyrical rant... although, apparently, he didn't write those lyrics alone: the quartet chipped in with all the words on this album, a series of letters to Juliet Capulet, of which this is probably the nastiest.

You're a swine
And I'm saying
That's an insult to the pig...

6. The Sir Douglas Quintet - Bacon Fat

Class old rock 'n' roll number - if in doubt, invent a wacky dance and name it after a favourite foodstuff. Doug Sahm had a surprisingly long career (this is the only one of his songs I own, but it's not even mentioned on the band's lengthy iffypedia discography), though it appears he only had one actual hit (1966's She's About A Mover - also worth a listen if you have the time). 

5. Arab Strap - Piglet

Philophobia is arguably the best Arab Strap album even if it does leave you feeling like you need a good wash after listening to it. Here, Aidan Moffat details what happens when he looks through his girlfriend's copy of Winnie The Pooh while she's in the shower... and discovers a terrible truth she's been hiding. Things go pretty bad from there and the song ends with one of the bitterest put downs ever committed to vinyl / digital media. 

And when we were with your friends 
I just as might as well have been no one. 
And you can't get over your dead dog 
Well, it takes one to know one.

4. Meat Loaf - In The Land Of The Pig, The Butcher Is King

(Yes, but who's the Prime Minister?)

I'm still waiting on that new Meat / Steinman album that was promised earlier in the year. Here's one of their lesser collaborations: yes, it does sound a little Steinman-by-numbers with lines such as "they're the plugs and we're the sockets"... though apparently it was originally written for a Batman Musical he was involved with.

Can you imagine that? A Batman Musical sounds like a really bad idea (remember that dreadful Spider-Man one?)... unless you got Jim Steinman to compose the music. Then... it just might work, in a mad Tim Burton-esque. Sadly, it was never to be.

3. Suede - We Are The Pigs

(Well, quite. Some might argue that the truth behind these outrageous allegations really doesn't matter... even if DC didn't do it to a dead pig, he and over-privileged ilk have been doing it to the people of this country for years. We are the pigs.)

We Are The Pigs is a weird Suede song. It was the debut single from their second album, released just as Bernard Butler quit. A much darker record than the first one, it came out while the rest of Britpop was having a knees up. I think it stands up pretty well with the passage of time, though there were stronger tracks on Dog Man Star. This video was also banned for awhile... for being "too violent" or criticising the establishment? Nobody in Suede read out any British police phone numbers (999?) during the recording.

2. Admiral Fallow - Squealing Pigs

I like to think of Admiral Fallow as a 21st Century Deacon Blue... which is a little unfair to Ricky Ross and his pals, since they're still in the go and producing fine records. It's a better comparison than the "Scottish Mumfords" tag I've seen them labelled with elsewhere though, especially considering the downward trajectory of Mr. Mumford and his offspring of late.

Squealing Pigs was AF's debut single and is still one of their best... though I haven't heard their new album yet. 

1. Morrissey - Life Is A Pigsty

The epic centrepiece of Mozzer's 2006 album Ringleader of the Tormentors, and only he could have written a song with that title... at what point does it become self-mockery, eh, Moz? Reminiscent in places of Meat Is Murder (yet much more palatable), this actually goes a bit Space Oddity about halfway through... and is all the better for it.

I can't wait to hear what Moz thinks of Mr. Cameron now... 





Which is your bacon sandwich?

My Top Ten Jeans Songs

Surprisingly, despite making Number One in last week's Top Ten Jean Songs, Bruce doesn't make the Songs About Jeans chart at all... despite that iconic image above. (However, a band of his biggest fans do feature at #5.)

Here are ten songs about pulling your blue jeans on and getting that denim all dirty...

Special mentions to The Swinging Blue Jeans, Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves Of Destiny, Bob B. Soxx & The Blue Jeans, Mr. Little Jeans, Pissed Jeans, and Jack Jeans (I had to link to that one).



10. Gene Vincent - Blue Jean Bop

Be-Bop-A-Lula is one of the defining records of rock 'n' roll, but Gene Vincent was never really able to bottle that lightning again. This is about as close as he got, a "minor" follow-up "hit"... although this was back in the days when "minor" hits still sold a million copies even if they only made number 49 in the charts.

9. Little Man Tate - Hello Miss Lovely (So You Like My Jeans)

Unfairly labeled a poor man's Arctic Monkeys, Little Man Tate called it a day in 2009. Which is a shame, because they wrote witty, spiky guitar pop songs... the sort of thing the radio is sorely missing these days.

8. David Dundas - Jeans On

The 70s was obviously a great decade for songs about jeans (see below) and this is the one that famously doubled up as an advert for Brutus Jeans. It seems Dundas was a member of British nobility - his full name and title is Lord David Paul Nicholas Dundas - as his dad was Lawrence Aldred Mervyn Dundas, 3rd Marquess of Zetland (also a famous tennis player in the 40s).

Well, I never knew that.

Of course, iffypedia might have made it all up... you never know.

The song was also covered a few years back by Chungking... but sadly, I can't find their version on youtube.

7. The View - Same Jeans

Scruffy Scottish indie kids - they've had the same jeans on for four days now - with their only Top Ten hit from 2007. It's rare I say this... but it seems longer ago than that.

6. Jimmy Webb - Lady Fits Her Blue Jeans

As previously discussed on this site, Jimmy Webb is god. Although he's more famous as a songwriter than a performer, he's also released a succession of excellent solo albums over the last 40 years, five of which were recently reissued in an extremely affordable box set on the Rhino label. Considering how rare these albums were prior to the box set, it's pretty much an essential purchase for fans of quality songwriting. This is taken from the 4th album in the 5 disc set, 1974's Land's End. Gorgeous stuff.

5. The Gaslight Anthem - Blue Jeans & White T-Shirts

The Gaslight Anthem always wear their New Jersey roots on their sleeves and this one describes perfectly Bruce's famous 80s dress sense... while also throwing in a sly reference to early Tom Waits.

This track's a bit of a rarity, from the 2008 EP Señor and the Queen, but it stands up as well as some of their better known songs.

4. The Donnas - Dirty Denim

Classic spunky & punky girl-pop from the California foursome led by the female Brett Anderson. In the Suede versus Denim battle, it's hard to call a winner. The other Brett never wrote anything as bitchy as this...

You look like you've only slept for an hour
You smell like you haven't taken a shower
And your hair is so dirty
It makes you look like you're thirty

Your pants are slung way too low
I see stuff I don't wanna know
I wonder why you're so moody?
Is it 'cause you've got no booty?

3. Lana Del Rey - Blue Jeans

That second Lana Del Rey album - the one with Video Games on, the one that made her a star - is still an amazing piece of work, even if she's failed to live up to its potential since. The cognoscenti may have tried to expose her as a phoney or a poseur... but what do the cognoscenti know? She has a new album out this week - fingers crossed it's a return to form.

2. Denim - Back In Denim

Lawrence (he has no second name... except he does, and it's Hayward) started life in fondly remembered 80s indie band Felt. Then sometime in the early 90s, he folded up the Felt and embraced Denim - with added glam stomp. Since then, he's gone ultra lo-fi with Go Kart Mozart... but if you ask me, Denim will always be his finest hour.

1. Neil Diamond - Forever In Blue Jeans

Listen - money talks, all right? Even if it don't sing or dance or walk...

There is a popular mondgreen associated with this tune, that Neil's actually singing "Reverend Blue Jeans". Which would be wonderful... if it were true.

What can I say, if you don't appreciate a bit of classic Neil... there's something missing in your life.




Next week (if I have time) - the final part of the trilogy. My Top Ten Gene Songs.

Meanwhile, don't put your jeans back in the wardrobe just yet. Which is your Nick Kamen?