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The hook comes before the chorus, and it's very good. But I think the Kinks' You Really Got Me from the previous year (1964) hits harder out of the gate.

Many rock songs start with great hooks/riffs though. I am particularly fond of 20 foot tall guitar riff hooks/intros as practiced by classic hard rock and metal bands, often by doubling the riff/hook on lead guitar and bass.

Rock bands seem to excel at intros, and even the lengthy ones can be riveting.

And some song intros are so great that they overshadow the rest of the song.




A way to cheat on this is to have the intro technically be a separate song. Playing the album you get an extended intro, but you can just play the "main" song.

The start of Judas Priest's "Screaming for Vengeance" album does this with "The Hellion" blending in to "Electric Eye". "Electric Eye" also has one of the greatest riff/hooks in metal starting off right at the beginning of the song.


It’s doubly cheating because in the streaming world that would mean 2 plays (assuming intro is >=30s)


At the same time it is very hard, next to impossible, to get them in the right order, unless it is a personalized playlist.


Haha, lucky enough to have heard this played live. It is a classic for the ages.


Some other oddities that come to mind:

Squeeze's "Up the Junction" [1] has no chorus and lyrics ends with the title.

Hem's "Not California" [2] closes with the bridge.

[1] https://youtu.be/RQciegmLPAo?si=sXcMm0MgIUUOc5-q

[2] https://youtu.be/DQNknNX7HoA?si=AIQwfPzmjdAfr83g


Interesting - I don't think I'd heard Not California before.

An oddity that has become increasingly popular over nearly 20 years (breaking records for stream counts and singles chart tenure) is the Killers' Mr. Brightside, which only has one (repeated) verse. Which probably makes it a good singalong anthem.

It also starts with a nice (if short) guitar riff/hook.




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