“Hey Joe” by Jimi Hendrix.
“Sweet Child o’ Mine” by Guns N Roses (some have mentioned GNR but didnt see this one)
How 'bout “Great Divide” by Semisonic, tempestuous_tory? That’s my fave of theirs.
And AC/DC, but no mention of “Highway to Hell”, a simple but fun riff.
Man-o-War: “Defender” and “Crown and the Ring”
Skynyrd: “Free Bird”, “Simple Man” and “Tuesdays Gone”
Blackfoot: “Train Train” and “Fox Chase”
BOC: Live version of “Godzilla”
Kiss: “Detroit Rock City”
Just my two cents on the subject.
Can’t believe I got this one first:
Others of note:
[ul]
[li]Joe “King” Carrasco and the Crowns on Austin City Limits, ca. 1980, launching into “96 Tears” with Joe saying “This song caused me to flunk out of school . . .” while Kris Cummings started up that Acetone/Farfisa organ riff . . . .[/li][li]Joe Ely’s “Musta Notta Gotta Lotta”[/li][li]The Kinks’ “Till the End of the Day”[/li][li]Big Star’s “September Gurls”[/li][/ul]
I also can’t believe that no one else has mentioned The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band’s “The Intro and the Outro”:
Some great nominations in here. Big second-the-motion to cmkeller’s “Angry Young Man,” Balance’s “One Night in Bangkok,” Odieman’s “Sing Sing Sing” (the Benny Goodman arrangement, I assume), taddycat’s “Radar Love,” and many others.
My surprise: Nobody has yet mentioned Jethro Tull. The beginning to “Aqualung” is a classic, though for my money I prefer the piano noodling that breaks to guitar at the top of “Locomotive Breath.” And “Skating Away on the Thin Ice of a New Day” starts off pretty cool too…
Waiting Room - Fugazi
My My Hey Hey (Out of the Blue) and Hey Hey My My (Into the Black) - Neil Young
And a big nod on Holiday in Cambodia
Hmmm…most of mine are already taken. I’ll second all of Coldfire’s Rush intros, and add in 2112. I’ll also second Balance’s “Don’t Fear the Reaper.” Then I’d add in “All Along the Watchtower.”
And NothingMan? I’ll see your Two Step, and raise you Ants Marching. Especially any live version.
Billy Joel- “Allentown”
The Beatles- “Lucy In the Sky WIth Diamonds”
Rush- “Limelight”
Metallica- “The Unforgiven”
B*witched- “Jesse Hold On” (So sue me, I love those cute Irish chicks!)
Ozzy Osbourne- “No More Tears” AND “Crazy Train”
John Corrado Piano man…damn that’s some sweet piano stuff goin’ on there.
Anybody familiar with Dream Theater? The opening to “A Change of Seasons” is excellent.
others:
“Fanfare for the Common Man” by Copeland
“Olympic Fanfare” and “Olympic Spirit” by Williams
“Hyrulian Symphony” --Who can forget the opening music to The Legend of Zelda!!! (not me, obviously)
Averye0
The song Chameleon (I prefer the one by Maynard Ferguson), as well as Manteca (You’ll rarely hear a trumpet player that good in your whole life!)
Anyhoo, that’s jazz stuff. Other songs that I really like the intro’s of because of lyrics or rythm or whatnot:
Suicide Machines - Hey
The Offspring - Gone Away
Sublime - Wrong Way
Monty Python - The Lumberjack Song
Dash Rip Rock - Lets Go Smoke Some Pot
My friend’s band Short Changed - Right Handed
The Vandals - A Gun For Christmas
The Vandals - Dance Of The Sugarplum Fairies
Well, that’s all for now…I think I have more somewhere.
Late In The Evening- Paul Simon,
We Are The Champions- Queen,
and a song called Kryptonite by a band called 3 Doors Down, I think, never heard anything else by them but the song rocks, reminds me of 70’s type rock. How’s the rest of there stuff?
Here are two by Steely Dan (though there are plenty more).
“Peg” possibly their best intro with super-clean horns and a great bass line to go with it.
“Hey Nineteen” a drum beat, and then that one guitar note that is squeezed and held and then leads right into a that funky, quirky Dan sound.
Really doesn’t get any better.
Ill put in my vote for the opening monologue to George Thorogood’s “One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer”.
Anarchy and Pretty Vacant by the Pistols
Venus in Furs and various other by the Velvets
and one I’m too tired to recall the band name but…
“Another Girl, Another Planet” - about 70% guitar intro with 90 seconds of lyric stuck n the end. Excellent.
It sure is! Then again, I prefer Metropolis: Part I in this case. Honourable mentions: Space Dye Vest and The Mirror.
Another one I just thought of: the opening sequence to Savatages The Wake of Magellan album is awesome as well.
Ride on, by Christy Moore
Just wanted to pop in before heading out to Carowinds and see what’s what. Wow, tons of great responses. I swear that no one’s named a single bad song here (I’ve heard probably 90% of the ones mentioned)! Perhaps there’s a good positive correlation between a strong start and the rest of the song following suit. Hmm, I’m certainly willing to do any R-n-R related research!
Just a couple of thangs in no particular order and then I’m off:
Tempestuous Tory: Thanks! Appreciate the compliments. I agree with you about the basslines!
London Calling: “Another Girl, Another Planet” is by the Only Ones, fronted by the brilliant Peter Perrett. And oh, the memories you brought back by mentioning that particular song!
HenrySpencer: Had to get out Radios Appear after reading your post. “Book 'im Danno - Murder One!” Yeah!
Jayron: “Make sure you buy a Motley Crue t-shirt; all the proceeds go to get their lead singer out of jail!” Ah, the genius of the Dead Milkmen…
Anyway, thanks to you ALL again and please keep them rolling! You’re inspiring me to bust out some albums I haven’t listened to for a while, and that’s a very good thing.
Cheers,
R-n-R (One happy rocka)
Three more I thought of last night:
“Relax,” Frankie Goes to Hollywood
“Freeze Frame,” J Geils Band
This one doesn’t have an intro, really, so much as a direct leap into the song that’s extremely cool:
“Sweet Dreams,” Eurythmics
I thought of another spoken intro that I love.
Rocky Racoon - The Beatles: “Now somewhere in the Black Mountain Hills of Dakota, there lived a young boy named Rocky Racoon …”
I must also highly recommend the Beatles Anthology 3 version of the song, it cracks me up … “Sminking?”
That would have been the Only Ones, fronted by Peter Perrett, IIRC.
The Jimi Hendrix version of ‘All Along the Watchtower’ seems to satisfy the criteria of the OP.
In terms of an opening that is unmistakeably unique and succinct, but maybe not as musically impressive, is anything clearer than Obladi Oblada by the The Beatles?