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Bond Songs 0: Introduction

I should stress, that I don’t know what I’m talking about. I’m not an expert on the Eon James Bond films and I’ve no experience writing about music. However, not knowing what I’m talking about has never stopped me in the past.

This set of posts started while I was listening to the Of Human Bondage podcast [most recent episode https://pexlives.libsyn.com/roll-for-gators-or-live-and-let-die%5D which is doing a film-by-film critical look at the mad mess of misogyny, racism and gizmo-fueled British jingoism that is the Bond films. The more immediate cause was me just thinking about how many of the theme songs were sung by Welsh people. To be exact 16.7% of them, which is a lot given that Wales is a small county https://camestrosfelapton.wordpress.com/2021/09/19/todays-infographic-pie-charts-of-james-bond-movie-theme-singers/

Having spent time working that out, I thought I’d cover each of those songs one-by-one having already done a modicum of research. But I was busy at the time and so didn’t. Having become less busy, I thought I’d come back to the idea.

Some rules. I’ll cover usually just one song or piece of music per film but may occasionally look at some others where it is interesting. I’m not reviewing the films beyond what’s needed to give context but each post will be named after the film rather than the song.

The other question is the order. Odd numbers will be films going forward from 1962, even numbers will be films going backwards from 2021. That will bring the whole thing to an end in the 1980s, which is everybody’s favourite decade and has the best Bond films. No, but seriously, the Duran Duran[24] and Aha[22] songs are strong contenders even if the films are unloved. I’ll finish with a ranking of all the songs.

1 Dr. No (1962)
2 No Time to Die (2021)
3 From Russia with Love (1963)
4 Spectre (2015)
5 Goldfinger (1964)
6 Skyfall (2012)
7 Thunderball (1965)
8 Quantum of Solace (2008)
9 You Only Live Twice (1967)
10 Casino Royale (2006)
11 On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)
12 Die Another Day (2002)
13 Diamonds Are Forever (1971)
14 The World Is Not Enough (1999)
15 Live and Let Die (1973)
16 Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
17 The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)
18 GoldenEye (1995)
19 The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
20 Licence to Kill (1989)
21 Moonraker (1979)
22 The Living Daylights (1987)
23 For Your Eyes Only (1981)
24 A View to a Kill (1985)
25 Octopussy (1983)

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47 responses to “Bond Songs 0: Introduction”

  1. I have confess that the songs for “A View to a Kill” and “The Living Daylights” are two of my favourites from the entire Bond series, even if “A View to a Kill” is not very good. “The Living Daylights” is actually a pretty good Bond film and Timothy Dalton (who is of course Welsh) is a very underrated Bond in general.

    Liked by 1 person

  2. My wife describes Duran Duran songs as what happens when you try to pick up girls after dropping acid: “Hello Rio, I saw you dancing on the sand and — octopus! Union of the snake! Alarm clock!”

    Liked by 3 people

  3. My favorite was “Diamonds are Forever,” but that’s probably because it was one of the first Bond films I ever saw, and it has positive associations for me. Also, I remember being surprised it had gay characters in it. (Not very positive gay characters, but, at that point in my life, any gay representation was welcome.)

    And I’ve always loved the theme song.

    My favorite line was when Bond explained that diamonds had replaced the dog as a girl’s best friend.

    Liked by 2 people

    • Rewatching it for my book on the films (Sex for Dinner, Death for Breakfast) it struck me how much I like Tiffany Case. She’s isn’t anyone’s mistress, she has life goals (albeit “work for the mob, get rich” isn’t a deep goal) and her last line to James isn’t about sex, it’s about getting those lovely diamonds back from space. Plus Bambi and Thumper kicking 007’s butt is fun.
      Trivia note, this was originally conceived as James Bond vs. Goldfinger’s Brother but Gert Frobe wasn’t interested in playing his character’s more-evil twin.

      Liked by 2 people

    • The gay characters are at least interesting – it’s homophobic but not the normal homophobia.

      The wholly unexplained fake moon landing set (before moon landing conspiracy theories were even really a thing) is the best bit of that film. It’s like a pop-culture visual joke but aimed at future audiences.

      Liked by 1 person

  5. I find that the theme to Goldfinger really gets across its message – this film has a guy named Goldfinger in it. So there.

    Liked by 4 people

  6. Can you turn this data into any kind of graph? Nobody can say you don’t know what you’re talking about if you have a colorful graph!

    Liked by 3 people

  8. The only ones I can remember in detail are 5, 15, 18, 19, 22, 23, and 24. So it looks like I’ll be more interested in the later chapters. I have vague memories of 6 and 7 and will probably remember some of them when they come up.

    live and let die BAM BAM live and let die doo dee doo, doo dee doo doo doo

    Liked by 1 person

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