Ha, I have given this way too much though and actually made a "Best Intro" mix. I had to clearly define what constitutes an "Intro". I'll see if I can dig it up and upload it tonight when I am home. For now, here's the tracklist:
“Introductions Are In Order”
A Letmebestormy Mix
I’ve had this mix floating around in my head for a long time so I figured I needed to get it done before it got away from me. This is a mix of the best introductions in music….mostly rock music. Before I get into it, let me define as best I can the parameters I worked with.
For the purposes of this mix the definition of an “introduction” is as follows:
• An introduction can be verbal. That’s an automatic confirmation.
• An introduction can be instrumental. However, that instrumentation cannot be a regular part of the song itself. That is why after a serious debate with myself you won’t find songs like “Sweet Emotion”, “Baba O’Riley”, “Under Pressure” or even “Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress” on this mix. Those songs have sick beginnings (and they’ll be on “Beginnings” for sure) but I had to draw a hard line in the sand as to what separates an ‘introduction’ from a ‘beginning’.
• However, in the case of Alan Parsons, The Moody Blues, and Floyd I ran into a gray area. These are certainly tracks I would define as ‘introductions’, however on their respective albums these intros were given their own track and title. Does that make them a separate song and thus, lose their inherent ‘intro-ness’? Maybe. But to me, their function as “intro” clearly outweighed their existence as a sentient track on their own. For these tracks, they have been joined together and labeled as such.
As I said, I worked pretty much in rock music. I’m sure Sinatra, Bird, Dizzy, etc…had some powerful introductions in their day. I had to cap it. Originally I intended this mix to be a Top 10. It became clear quickly that was not going to happen. I ended up with 23 tracks and even then had to make some hard cuts. I’m sure I missed some real beauts, too. I think this is a pretty damn good representation given the criteria I set for myself. Alright, enough of my yapping. Let’s get to the tracks:
1) Let’s Go Crazy (Prince) - On a mix about Introductions, you can’t imagine the pressure of what track to put first. In the end I went with Prince, not because this intro is any better than any that follow it, but because it gets you fired up.
2) Sweet Jane (live, Lou Reed) – This may be the best instrumental intro ever. It’s just sick, flawlessly executed, slams right into the song. I can remember the first time I ever heard this on the radio. It blew my little mind.
3) Must Of Got Lost (live, J. Geils band) – This is up there as one of the best vocal intros. Peter Wolf tells a story of desperation. It builds and builds and they count off. That’s just great rock and roll.
4) The Way (live, Jill Scott backed by The Roots) – This is from Dave Chappelle’s Block Party. Dave intros this great track. It’s sort of a 2for1 intro. You get the vocal intro followed by the thick and heavy guitar from The Roots. Tubbs, wait in the car.
5) Sirius>Eye In The Sky (The Alan Parsons Project) – Nevermind that Sirius served as the intro music for Michael Jordan and The Bulls when they owned the world, but man the segue into Eye In The Sky is sublime. Say what you want, Alan Parsons is master in the studio.
6) Celluloid Heroes (live, The Kinks) – This is a pretty personal track for me as the guitar solo that intros this track is the very first thing I learned on guitar decades ago. I can still remember trying to make my fingers play it. My whole approach to guitar can be traced to this track. It’s an incredible instrumental intro that was never on the studio version. This can be found on “One For The Road” and was recorded at The Volkhaus, Zürich, Switzerland, 11 November 1979.
7) Intro>I’ll Go Crazy (Live at the Apollo, James Brown) – You can’t have a mix of intros without one for James Brown, the hardest working man in showbiz. Period.
8) Departure>Ride My See-Saw (The Moody Blues) – Before they packed up and moved to Cheesyville, The Moody Blues were some trippy mother****ers. These two tracks open up their 1968 “In Search of the Lost Chord” album. This album got a lot of late night play in our college dorm room where you could often hear us mutter “The Moody Blues were some trippy mother****ers”.
9) I Can’t Turn You Loose>Everybody Needs Somebody to Love (live at the Palace Hotel Ballroom, The Blues Brothers) – Ok people, you get a twofer here. The first intro is by the late great Cab Calloway over the Otis Redding classic “I Can’t Turn You Loose”. The second intro is Elwood Blues welcoming you to the Palace Hotel Ballroom. These tracks have never been released on any soundtrack. I had to download the entire movie, trim it, and convert it to audio. I get chills every time I listen to this.
10) Casey Jones (The Grateful Dead) – *sniff*. Enough said.
11) Bodhisattva (live, Steely Dan) – This is another candidate for best vocal introduction ever. The emcee is Steely Dan’s truck driver, Jerome Aniton. Jerome was pretty much a walking, drinking, disaster zone. He crashed the band’s truck on numerous occasions. He was the comedian of the crew and thus was given the responsibility to introduce the band. The more he drank, the better the introductions – and you can hear the band cracking up in the background. Adding to the hilarity is that Jerome thought that Donald Fagan’s name was “Stevie Dan”. On one occasion, ever unsteady on his feet, Jerome stumbled into Fagan's grand piano on stage and said to one of the other players, "I bumped into Stevie's piano."
12) Speak To Me>Breathe (Pink Floyd) – Look, you can throw a dart at a list of Floyd songs and most likely will hit a track that deserves to be on this mix. Time, Money, Echoes, Sheep, Another Brick in the Wall II – ALL of them easily qualified to be in this mix. In the end I went with Speak To Me>Breathe. It’s not just the intro of one song to another but the intro into one of the greatest albums ever recorded. The heartbeats followed by the various themes you soon will hear merging into Clare Torry’s wail as you hit “Breathe” – brilliant.
13) I Saw Her Standing There (The Beatles) – But…it’s a simple count off. Why does this deserve to make the list? Simple. It is THE count off. This count off didn’t just introduce us to “I Saw Her Standing There”. This count off didn’t just introduce us to their 1963 album “Please Please Me”. This count off introduced the world to The Beatles. There is no more important count off in rock and roll history. Other Beatles tracks that lost out to this seminal track are the airplanes introducing The White Album and the orchestra warming up at the beginning of Sgt. Peppers.
14) Proud Mary (Tina Turner solo. Sorry Ike, I didn’t use ya) – Just a brilliant cover. Admit it, you like it nice and rough.
15) Intro>God Save the Queen (Jimi Hendrix Live at the Isle of Wight) – There are a LOT of great Hendrix intros out there. I like Jimi’s banter on this one.
16) Stonehenge (Spinal Tap) – eh, it deserves to be here.
17) Intro>You Sexy Thing (live, Tom Tom Club) – I love the funk underneath the intro that develops into the melody of the song.
18) The Ocean (Led Zeppelin) – You gotta love Bonzo’s pep talk to the band, "We've done four already but now we're steady, and then they went 1, 2, 3, 4!” and then they end up with this brilliant take. The only problem is you can barely hear him and if you turn it way up, be aware that the opening guitar riff will slay your ears – as it’s supposed to.
19) Lola (live, The Kinks) – Over the years, Ray Davies would tease audiences throughout their concerts about whether they would play Lola….often a half dozen or more times before finally playing it in the second encore or something. This version is a twofer intro with a vocal tease followed by a very pretty acoustic run through of a verse. This was recorded at the good ‘ol Providence Civic Center, Providence, RI, 23 September 1979.
20) Harry Hood Intro>2001 (live, Phish) - This one is for my Phish loving friends. As the 20th century turned into the 21st century Phish on 12/31/1999 Phish launched into an all night set which started at midnight and ended when the sun came up on the Seminole Reservation in Florida. It was the largest concert on the entire planet that night and I’m not sure if any other band has ever pulled off something so lofty as playing an entire night without any breaks. With just a hint of dawn creeping into the black of night Phish played the opening chords of Harry Hood (which they had played the night before). It quickly segued into a 13+min version of Deodato’s “Also Sprach Zarathustra”. My take on it was Phish was giving the audience who had been dancing now for 6 hours straight a quick “just want to make sure you’re still with us” gut check.
21) The Fat Albert Theme Song (written by Ricky Sheldon and Edward Fournier) – The opening bass line followed by “Hey Hey Hey!” instantly qualified this tv tune for the list.
22) You Can’t Always Get What You Want (The Rolling Stones) – The Stones have LOT of tunes with amazing beginnings (Gimme Shelter, Monkey Man, Satisfaction, JJFlash, I could go on forever) but amazing intros? Not so many. This one qualifies though. It features the London Bach Choir powerfully opening the song under the stewardship of Javier Sanchez Broto, highlighting throughout, and bringing it to an uproarious conclusion.
23) Love, Reign O’er Me (The Who) – As with a few of their predecessors on this list, The Who had multiple nominations for the list. In the end I went with the thunder, wind, rain, piano, and percussion that ushers in the final track of their masterful 1973 album “Quadrophenia”...and also concludes this mix. The Who have a lot of tracks that have amazing beginnings/intros that sort of ride the line between the two…i.e. “Overture”, “Baba O’Riley”, “Won’t Get Fooled Again”. The track that came in second to Love Reign O’er Me was actually the opening track of Quadrophenia “I Am The Sea” which features the 4 themes in the album and ultimately crashes into “The Real Me”. Check it out.
There you have it my friends. 23 of the greatest introductions I could come up with in rock history. If you have some suggestions for Volume II, I’d like to hear ‘em! Stay tuned as I have a couple more mixes taking form and hope to have them published shortly.
Cheers,
Cassidy