Keeping with the Nick Hornby theme, something that always vaguely bugged me about "High Fidelity " was when Barry asks for the 'top five side one, track ones ever'. Rob then proceeds to list "Thunder Road"; Bruce Springsteen, "Smells Like Teen Spirit"; Nirvana, "Let's Get It On"; Marvin Gaye, "Airbag"; Radiohead. Now the problem is this, does Barry mean 'top five side one, track ones ever in the context of starting off an album' or 'top five side one, track ones ever in the context of stand alone singles'?
Now I'm not usually this pedantic, but the two different questions would get completely different results. For example, my 'top five side one, track ones ever in the context of starting off an album' would be:You see, these songs are all good as they are, but only great because they set the album off perfectly. 'Kill The Last Romantic' is the perfect example, as on its own it's just an nice minute long piece of music, however in the context of opening a great chiasmatic1 piece of music, it's immense. But it's not a great stand alone single. Those would be:
Which if released as singles, should all go straight to number one.
You may think that it's rather sad to quibble over minor details like that, but these things are important!
1: Chiasmatic: Adj. 'describing a literary structure that can be seen as x-shaped. Kind of like the words have a symmetry'
(8)Kill The Last Romantic - Easyworld
(t) Helen
EIIRP is a brilliant opener. As is Airbag. And Planet Telex. Radiohead are rather good at openings...
See this is the thing, sometimes it's like the album peaks after track 1 and it never gets any better.
Source Tags And Codes by AYWKUSBTTOD in my opinion has the best three opening tracks of any album ever and then just goes rather average.
F***** in the bushes is also probably the best track (apart from maybe 'who feels love') on Standing on the shoulders of giants. It seems like a cruel joke by the Gallaghers to make everyone eagerly await a new album and a returned to form Oasis, give them such an awesome opening track, then giving them 'Go Let It Out'.
wha?!?!? 'wo feels love?' was shite. the only other good songs are 'gas panic' and definitely 'little james'
'who feels love' is awesome. Especially the video of it. Little James, now that was awful. Worst. Oasis. Lyrics. Ever. And to be the worst Oasis lyrics ever takes a lot of effort.
i may have been using sarcasm there...
the whole album is an attempt to rewrite 'revolver'. the opening guitar-y song, the straightforward second tarck, the indian-type third song... bloody ridiculous.
gotta be welcome to the jungle by gnr! maybe...
or back in the saddle by aerosmith?
strutter by KISS?
tough call!
Helen?? As in the one who used to share this site with you?
you really scare me
yeah, I scare a lot of people. but i'm really not that scary when you get to know me... no... not that scary at all.... *evil laugh*
Yes, you know shockingly we still speak occasonally :O
And I think caff meant me. Probably.
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David
what about!:
1) If Winter Ends - Bright Eyes
2) Walking Barefoot - Ash
3) Bombtrack - RATM
4) Untitled - Interpol
5) Arcarsenal - At The Drive-In
in fact, there's HUGE scope for this. some album openers are better than the whole album...
NOTE: EIIRP is a good opener in the context of the whole Kid A experience