# Did I imagine the intro to Living For The City?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-i-imagine-the-intro-to-living-for-the-city/835009>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [June 4, 2019, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-i-imagine-the-intro-to-living-for-the-city/835009 "2019-06-04T12:39:43Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\
**Post date:** [June 4, 2019, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-i-imagine-the-intro-to-living-for-the-city/835009/1 "2019-06-04T12:39:43Z")

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Went to contribute to the best intro thread with Stevie Wonder’s Living For The City because I remember a spoken intro that starts “New York City, just like I pictured it!” And then the unnamed narrator quickly gets arrested. But in all of my searches, there is no soundclip, youtube video or lyrics website that has this intro. A search of the phrase ‘New York City, just like I pictured it’ yields comedy routines and links to the movie New Jack City.

Was this a soundbite my local radio used to play in front of this song all the time? Am I mixing up two different memories (I do that sometimes)? Is my NYCenteredness showing? What am I remembering?

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**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\
**Post date:** [June 4, 2019, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-i-imagine-the-intro-to-living-for-the-city/835009/2 "2019-06-04T12:48:09Z")

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It’s in the middle of the song about 4 minutes in:

[https://youtu.be/GzR51V82tnY?t=255](https://youtu.be/GzR51V82tnY?t=255)

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**Author:** ![Biggirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biggirl/32/3294_2.png) [@Biggirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biggirl)\
**Post date:** [June 4, 2019, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-i-imagine-the-intro-to-living-for-the-city/835009/3 "2019-06-04T12:51:55Z")

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> [@don\_t\_ask](#):
>
> It’s in the middle of the song about 4 minutes in:
> 
> [https://youtu.be/GzR51V82tnY?t=255](https://youtu.be/GzR51V82tnY?t=255)

Oh! Thank you. No wonder I couldn’t find it in the intro. The stations played it like an outro. Skyscrapers and everathang! Said the word “Nigger” all the time on the radio.

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**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\
**Post date:** [June 4, 2019, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/did-i-imagine-the-intro-to-living-for-the-city/835009/4 "2019-06-04T13:02:52Z")

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A friend had a procedure and her eyes were so sensitive to light that she had to get driven home with gauze over both eyes. As she was guided from the car, she did a little bobblehead move and said “New York City, just like I pictured it!” in a perfect Stevie voice.

She was in Pittsburgh at the time.