I'm new to this but I'll jump in at the deep and learn to swim as I go along.

Generally I'm not too successful with the girls but apparently I'm not bad looking and once I get going, the banter comes easily. My main problem I find is having something concrete to open a convo with. I've accidentally come across some lines which have been a success in the past:

1.
To other guy with girl: 'Nice shoes dude'
Guy: 'Hu?'
You: 'You can tell everything about someone from their shoes'
Guy: 'ok, what kind of a person am I'
etc etc. You're in there and then you can move onto girl, you know how the rest flows. Rather than any massive plan this just seems to work to get the convo going.

2.
Pretend you're The AMOG Kelly from 'The Girl next door' i.e. What would Kelly do?

3.
'What do you think of this band? I'm meant to be reporting about them but I haven't thought up anything to write yet.'

These have all had varying degrees of success but I wanna hear opening scenarios and ways to get things kicked off. Especially ones that don't rely on having an awesome back story ready for interrogation.

Your feedback is much appreciated.