Best and worst live opener

Love Prayer as an opener because it just starts to give me chills, but again, i think that song should close the opening set or even the show....but I think the best I've heard is One Wild Night.

Strangest (not necessarily the worst) was Celluloid Heroes at Shephards Bush, didn't expect that at all.

Really don't like the HAND version of LMS, so think that's the poorest opener.

Worth a try I would say. Certainly better than LH as opener

I believe was an awesome opener in 92. Rockin in the Free World didn't work too well in my opinion either. One Wild Night worked very well as an opener and I wish to hell it made an appearance in the setlist now and again.

I think Prayer and LYHOM are the best openers. The brass section starting LYHOM worked really well with the drums and then the song kicking in, and Prayer is just an awesome opener.

LH is a good song but it's crap as an opener, especially with the country bullshit at the beginning (the intro's an ok song but the band does it crap.)

I think that Hey God would be an awesome opener. It all goes dark and then suddenly you hear that heavy guitar and all the lights go up (fireworks?).
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Vapormatic Vaporizer

I think we have been here before, but here goes.

I agree, worst is LH. I don't mind the song but poor opener IMO.

I don't think it has to be a hit but a solid song to start off, so something like:

It's my life - They could let out some Wow, wow's before the band hit the stage to set this song up.

Runaway - Why not?

Raise your hands - Great energy song to start off.

Hook me up - Bit of a wild card - Hello is there anybody out there?

Probably the best I have seen is Lay Your Hands On Me with the marching band intro in 1996. That was cool.

Anything with a great intro which builds up the anticipation. LMS actually worked really well at this. An extended intro to IML would do the trick to.

My first BJ concert was Wembley 2000 and they opened with London Calling! That was a bit of a random start!!

Im with most in that Prayer really works, but its best to have it at the end of the set. Raise Your Hands would be a good one, start as you mean to go on.
The worst opener would probably be Bad Name!

IMO the best opener was I Believe! from the Keep The Faith Tour in 1993 with the pyro going off behind the stage.

Others:

.Lay Your Hands On Me - New Jersey Tour
.Rocking In The Free World
.One Wild Night
.Lay Your Hands On Me/Marching Band - These Days Tour

Of the ones I've seen:

Prayer - Works well, obviously gets the party started with a bang and instantly gets the audiences attention; but I guess for a lot people it's maybe wearing a little thin, given it's the opener on both the proper DVDs the band has released, the Zurich version in also on OWN Live, and they opened with it a lot on both the Cross Road and Crush tours, and they always seem to do it in exactly the same way as an opener. Maybe it should open an encore instead?

Bounce - Wasn't too keen on it as an opener. Too short, and they didn't perform it with enough punch. IMO it was much better when they played it at MK on the HAND tour

Last Man Standing - I liked it, it was good, the use of the catwalk was effective, and although Jon's doesn't put the most energy in the world into it it's still a powerful opener. Takes a bit of time to get started though

Rockin' In The Free World - I really enjoyed it, mainly because I didn't expect it at all. I think it's great to use as an occasional opener, but probably shouldn't open shows regularly

From what I've seen on Youtube, I Believe looks awesome, Lay Your Hands looks pretty cool, both the '89 drum intro version and the '96 marching band version (although I'm not the biggest fan of the song live), One Wild Night looks decent (lots of energy), and Lost Highway admittedly does look kinda entertaining ... although I think the song is pretty average, I actually like the way on the Lost Highway DVD they just go straight into it, with no buildup at all

I have to add that IMO Prayer seems to work better as an opener than it does anywhere else in the main set .... I remember that I thought it didn't quite work closing the main set in 2006, although I can't quite pinpoint why

Hmm, see I think it's great as the main set closer.