Short Attention Span to the Extreme

[Rael Imperial Aerosol Kid]

Reading the debate about listening to songs vs whole albums got me thinking: what if we took the short-attention span thing to the extreme.... to the point where single sound snippets is all we listened to??

Here are some that would be on my playlist:
- Harrison's opening 12-string guitar chord on "A Hard Day's Night"
- Robert Plant yelling "Suck" just before Page's solo on "Communication Breakdown"
- Roger Daltrey's scream at 4:28 on "Won't Get Fooled Again"
- The Righteous Bros "Unchained Melody" when Bobby Hatfield goes up about three octaves on the word "Need" when he sings "I NEED your love"
- the opening drum hit on Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone"
- Steve Howe's harmonics on the second sound at the beginning of Yes' "Roundabout"
- Eddie Vedder's tortured screaming "Myyyy....hine....." in "Black" at the end of the line "...why can't it be mine"


any one wanna add to the list?

[noddin0ff]

The radio tuning that dials in the opening phrase of Wish You Were Here.

[Stone]

The radio tuning that dials in the opening of "Around the Dial" by The Kinks.

.....

[Davey]

The radio tuning that dials in the opening phrase of Wish You Were Here.

The radio tuning that dials in the opening of "Around the Dial" by The Kinks

Yeah, we could have a whole thread on just that, songs that open with AM radio tuning. That great closer "Gasoline Horseys" from the first Sparklehorse album was another fun one that starts out with a highly distorted transistor radio sound and then kind of like Pink Floyd's fisbowl song it morphs into a very nice sounding full bodied, high fidelity first class travelling set as he gradually turns off the distortion machines.

But speaking of Sparklehorse, one of my favorite moments is in their song "Cow", which heads right off into Neil Young and Crazy Horse guitar territory as processed through the warped mind and electronics of Mark Linkous, with a string of cryptic fragmented images, finally ending with one of the most poignant images ever in, "pretty girl, milkin' a cow, oh yeah." Gets me everytime.

That and Bjork, at the end of the "throwing everything off the cliff" song (Hyperballad), when she gradually turns off the electronics until finally exposing just the cello and viola. Beautiful ending.

And Ex Lion Tamer will probably back me on this, but I always loved the ice clinking in the glasses and the coin spinning on the table at the beginning of "Alice In Wonderland" (I think, pretty sure it's at the beginning of side 2) on that great Sunday At The Village Vanguard session with the Bill Evans trio. Really gives the recording a foundation and atmosphere to hear the room sounds in three dimensions like that. Puts you in the room.

[ForeverAutumn]

The opening of Rush's Tom Sawyer is always a magic moment for me.

[GMichael]

The phase shifted drum solo in Queen's Sheer Heart Attack, News of The World.
"And the meek shall inherit the Earth" from Rush 2112
"Stranger in this town" P.F.'s Young Lust, The Wall.
The opening few notes from Yes' Roundabout.
"Come on Dave. Give me a Break" Van Halen Mean Streets.

[Troy]

The first 5 notes of Floyd's "Have a Cigar."

The hard to find on CD "James Bond" intro to the Beatles "Help."

The yodeling/flute intro to Jethro Tull's "Cross Eyed Mary."

The xylophone solo in Godly and Creme's "Sandwiches of You."

Adrian Belew's whammy bar intro to Joan Armatrading's "The Key."

The offtime bass-pedal stabs at the end of Jellyfish's "New Mistake."

The first 8 notes of Genesis' "Dance on a Volcano."

[noddin0ff]

Oh, and due to a roommate who always played it after 5 beers, which was startlingly frequent, the opening power chords of 'Back in Black' will forever be indelibly imprinted on my mind.

[Dusty Chalk]

- That reverse-reverb/chord thingy somewhere in the middle of "Circles in the Sand" by Tear Garden off of Last Man to Fly

- The drum break in "Desire" by Talk Talk off of Spirit of Eden

- The premature bass "gank" at the end of the last set of lyrics sung on "Shadow of the Hierophant" by Steve Hackett off of Voyage of the Acolyte

- When the piano comes in on "Close (to the Edit)" by Art of Noise off of...whatever it's off of...

- "Silence in the studio!" by some weird band right after this acid trip section, just before the orchestra kicks in.

- Where the guitars split off into left and right channels during "Pigs (Three Different Ones)"

- "Lunatic Fringe", Red Rider -- that moment -- you know what it is

- the end of "Numbers"/the beginning of "Computer World Pt. 2" by Kraftwerk

- the phased violins during "Evil Woman" by ELO

- the drum break during "In the Air Tonight"

- speaking of drum breaks, that part of "The Rhythm of the Heat" where things get real tribal

- Steve Hackett has a tribal moment during one of the songs on Till We Have Faces

- ELO, "The Jungle" -- what can I say? I really like tribal drums...

- the end of the choir/the beginning of the guitar of "The Mountain" by PFM

[Dave_G]

The outer space noodling sound on Arriving UFO on Tormato.

"One Break coming up" - DLR on a Van Halen song which name eludes me.

That weird sound on Battle of Epping Forset, kind of sounds like rainfall. I think it's Steve on guitar.

Plua many parts on the Lamb, esp. the crescendo right after PG says "windshield on the freway", that is a great moment when turned up to 11.

Dave

[Dusty Chalk]

- the auralgasm during "Unreadable Communication" by Curve
- the auralgasm during "Visions in Blue" by Ultravox
- the brief loud part during Julee Cruise's "Into the Night"

"Come on Dave. Give me a Break" Van Halen Mean Streets.

"One Break coming up" - DLR on a Van Halen song which name eludes me.

You two think alike.

[GMichael]

- the auralgasm during "Unreadable Communication" by Curve
- the auralgasm during "Visions in Blue" by Ultravox
- the brief loud part during Julee Cruise's "Into the Night"You two think alike.

Oh man. Someone is paying attention. What's up with that?