What's the best opening lyric to open an album

[stip]

Thoughts? I was thinking about this a bit this afternoon (some of these lyrics get better if they play out a little further)


I admit it, what's to say? I'll relive it, without pain
Please don't go out on me, don't go on me now?
Lives opened and trashed, look ma watch me crash
Large fingers pushing paint. you're god and you've got big hands
Whose got the brain of JFK? What's it mean to us now?
There's a girl on a ledge, she's got nowhere to turn
I wanna shake, I wanna wind out, I wanna leave this mind and shout
You're always saying that there's something wrong
Do you wanna here something sick, we are but victims of desire
Everyone's a critic looking back up the river. Every boat is sinking in this town.
Drowning in their dissertations, random speakers in my mind

It's clearly Last Exit, right? Though the Brain of J lyric is fun, and drowning in their dissertations is a good phrase

[Ms Harmless]

Last Exit, closely followed by Sometimes

good thread!

[digster]

I'd say Breakerfall, but you'd have to add the next line.

[Farmer John]

Last Exit, closely followed by Sometimes

good thread!

Yep. Closely followed by Brain of J after that.

[JuanHamm]

Last Exit, closely followed by Sometimes

good thread!

Agreed

[Ms Harmless]

also I'm still staunchly defending GSMF's lyrics, even if I don't think they got the best out of the song performance / production-wise

[Ms Harmless]

I still say GSMF is a "fun" light mockery of a "grunge" song; I wish they'd used that impulse for the album as a whole, it's undercut with too much un-nuanced serious and silly extremes

[Coach]

My current fave:

Can you hear? Are we clear?

[McParadigm]

Please don't go out on me, don't go on me now
Lives opened and trashed, look ma watch me crash
Large fingers pushing paint. you're god and you've got big hands
Whose got the brain of JFK? What's it mean to us now?

What a perfect summation of the band’s journey during those formative years

[stip]

I still say GSMF is a "fun" light mockery of a "grunge" song; I wish they'd used that impulse for the album as a whole, it's undercut with too much un-nuanced serious and silly extremes

agreed. actually maybe not. It is fairly present for the first 4 songs but then it does disappear -lt would have been interesting to see them play with that a bit more with the slower songs and mid tempo anthems, but I do like what follows and I think its all fairly nuanced (lyrically)

[stip]

I'd say Breakerfall, but you'd have to add the next line.

definitely the lyric that benefits the most from the next line. the next last exit lyric is also excellent but what is here stands alone

[stip]

every boat is sinking in this town is a fun casual apocalypse lyric

[Ms Harmless]

I still say GSMF is a "fun" light mockery of a "grunge" song; I wish they'd used that impulse for the album as a whole, it's undercut with too much un-nuanced serious and silly extremes

agreed. actually maybe not. It is fairly present for the first 4 songs but then it does disappear -lt would have been interesting to see them play with that a bit more with the slower songs and mid tempo anthems, but I do like what follows and I think its all fairly nuanced (lyrically)

[washing machine]

I wanna leave this mind and shout sets the stage for Riot Act and is also a pretty universal feeling for the time it was made. Clearly the best opening line for a Pearl Jam album.

[davidsatelle100]

I wanna shake, I wanna wind out, I wanna leave this mind and shout


But its hard to take a line without thinking of the whole song.

Taking the whole song

There's a girl on a ledge, she's got nowhere to turn

[davidsatelle100]

Also GREAT Thread

[epilogue]

I wanna leave this mind and shout sets the stage for Riot Act and is also a pretty universal feeling for the time it was made. Clearly the best opening line for a Pearl Jam album.

+1

[liebzz]

I wanna leave this mind and shout sets the stage for Riot Act and is also a pretty universal feeling for the time it was made. Clearly the best opening line for a Pearl Jam album.

+1

I agree also.

I am gonna post in some other threads too cause you can’t keep me heeeeeeerrrrreeee.

[tragabigzanda]

pearl jam sucks now

[epilogue]

I wanna leave this mind and shout sets the stage for Riot Act and is also a pretty universal feeling for the time it was made. Clearly the best opening line for a Pearl Jam album.

+1

I also think it’s the strongest opening lyric relative to the time of its release. We knew the album would be about Bush and the Iraq war, we had seen the album cover…A conceptual picture was starting to emerge. But that opening drum beat was new territory for them, and that lyrics was in immediate invitation to Ed’s experience during a time that felt pretty raw for everyone.

Contest that with Breakerfall, which is a fine opening lyrics, but didn’t take on some larger immediate context, IMO.

Well said. Though, I might be even lower on the opening Breakerfall lyric. I think it's pretty dopey. It's one of the reasons I had such a hard time finding my way to Binaural as a record.

And I guess to go even further with the Can't Keep line, I think they work far beyond their context, too. I think outside of Riot Act, just as words on a page, as an independent thought/expression, the lines are so fucking moving and potent.