This is the intro. It goes at the beginning before the words start. "Just like songs, really," says Jon Lewin, fresh from a bout of intensive research into the subject of beginnings.

"How do I begin?" sang some prat in 'Love Story'. The answer to that, for most songwriters, is not at the beginning. A song's introduction is normally the last bit that gets written, a few bars tacked onto the front after the rest of the tune is finished. It rarely receives as much attention as the main body of the song.

Which is a bit daft. The intro is the first thing that people will hear, which makes it possibly the most important part of the song. And the intro is often the only part of a song that the A&R man hears. That's what captures the listener, so it's got to count.

ER

[I've made some assumptions: that you're trying to be commercially successful, that you want to make maximum impact, and that you're not suffering from New Age, or some similarly long-winded affliction. And that you've already written most of the song we're discussing. Obvious, really.]

AWOP

Let's start at the very beginning. The intro is there to set the mood, to grab your attention, and to give an indication of what's going to happen in the next few minutes. So how does your song start at the moment?

We get lots of demos that begin with four reverbed clicks from the drums. No no no. No. Use them live by all means, but have the decency to edit them out when dubbing off your masters. If you do start with drums on their own, make a meal of them: remember 'Blue Monday' by New Order, and that impossibly fast bass drum? Or how about Dave Clark's beautifully dumb intro to 'Bits 'n' Pieces' — four bass drumbeats and a snare roll?

If you're making dance music, it's important to establish the rhythm early on — but be wary of the four-bars-of-drumbox-and-in cliche. If you're good enough, you can use just bass and drums to set the groove in the intro. With a little extra percussing, this can be quite catchy enough. Think of 'Mony Mony' (preferably in the classic original version of Tommy James & The Shondells), where the poppy plonkings of bass, drums, and tambourine drag you into the song itself.

BOP

The most straightforward way of beginning a song is a four count, and into the chords to the verse, but without vocals. That's OK, but it's hardly exciting. How's about getting synth or guitar to play a melody over this first section? It can be an extemporisation on the vocal line, or something else entirely: Gerry Rafferty's 'Baker Street' is remembered chiefly for that soaring sax riff which starts the song; 'Careless Whisper' begins with a sax solo; the Bible's 'Graceland' similarly.

ALOO

If you are going to use the regular chords from the first part of the song, try doing something imaginative with them. Be aware of dynamics — break down the order in which the parts come in. Think of 'I Heard It Through The Grapevine', and the calculated way in which the arrangement builds up into 'Bet you're wondering how I knew...'

Beware of launching Ramones-like into a song at full tilt, as any drop for the vocals is going to be an anti-climax. This is part of the reason songs like 'Do You Really Want To Hurt Me' start at half tempo — same chords as the rest of the song, but played slowly and sparely. Half-time intros set up a tension that the rest of the song resolves.

"The intro is there to set the mood, to grab your attention..."

BUP

Remember that the first moments of the song do much for setting the overall atmosphere. A half tempo start is usually indicative of introspection, of a contemplative mood — the singer can't think and sing at the same time, apparently. That melancholy sax solo in 'Careless Whisper' makes you pretty sure that this isn't another jolly song about bonking; interestingly, the doowop "Jitterbug" phrases in 'Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go' imply exactly the reverse. The grandiose synths at the start of Queen's 'I Want To Break Free' are a tongue-in-cheek indication that there's a serious subject coming.

It follows that if you're writing a rip-snorting krotch-krusher of a ditty, you'll want a Doc Marten-clad intro. 'Whole Lotta Love'? 'All Right Now'? 'Smoke On The Water'? forthright guitar riffs, every metal man-jack of them. Listen to The Kinks' 'You Really Got Me', and marvel at the exquisite timing of that snare beat in between the guitar phrases. Learn to punctuate like that.

All these riffs are integral parts of the structure of their song. Other guitar figures can work, but unless you reuse them later in the arrangement, they'll seem irrelevant. Listen to Cliff & The Shads' 'Move It', Johnny Kidd's 'Shaking All Over', or virtually any Chuck Berry song. Pete Townshend's strummed suspended chords in 'Pinball Wizard' perform the same function.

ALOP

Try starting the song with the chorus (of Mel & Kim's 'Respectable'), or middle eight. 'River Deep Mountain High' begins (and ends) with the descending riff that takes the chorus back into the verse. So does The Monkees' 'I'm A Believer'. There's a pleasing logic in introducing the song with a theme that's going to be repeated later on. And the more you repeat your tuney bits, the more likely the listener is to remember them.

There is another option as demonstrated by Procul Harum in 'Whiter Shade Of Pale'. Start with someone else's famous tune (Bach's in this case), and your sure of recognition straight off. How did 'All You Need Is Love' start? With the first bars of the French national anthem. But be careful where you're nicking from, and how much. Composers these days can be most litigious.

DAM

Which brings us to sampling, and the matter of novelty. This applies chiefly to recorded music, though samplers and backing tapes are beginning to extend the vocabulary of sounds available live. Sampled vocals are a big deal for intros: "Please please tell me now," blurted Duran Duran; "Master and servant," said Depeche Mode. Whistle's irritating "(Nothing Serious) Just Buggin" used a sampled voice as its bass line.

But like all novelties, their appeal wears rapidly — sampled vocals will be to the late 1980s what phasing was to the mid 1960s. Sound effects on records are a little less clichéd. Stevie Wonder's 'Living In The City' and the Loving Spoonful's 'Summer In The City' both use urban noises as an integral part of their appeal. 'Roadblock' starts at a party. Kraftwerk used the sound of dialling to set the rhythm for their recent single "Telephone Call"... With the increased availability of samplers, we can expect more and more records to incorporate found sounds into their structure, rather than as unconnected effects laid over the top. Chunks of sampled film dialogue are even now beginning to take the place of that pre-verse instrumental melody mentioned above.

BOOM

However: everything you've just read doesn't matter if the song is good enough. Cole Porter's 'Night & Day' has a whole minor key 'verse' about beat beat boating tom toms, which most sensible singers leave out. The Pet Shop Boys' 'West End Girls' has a quiet tinkly beginning put there (I reckon) for the DJs to talk over. But these are extreme cases; you should take as much care over the front end as you can. But then, that applies to the whole song.