Bond CD Reviews: Die Another Day and Silva Compilation

Die Another Day *** 1/2

DAVID ARNOLD

WEA

15 tracks - 55:02

David Arnold's third instalment of big Bond music is undoubtedly his best 007 opus to date. Sadly, it gets short thrift on this Warner release, which ultimately sacrifices symphonic running time for "enhanced" supporting materials and an extraneous Paul Oakenfold remix.

There's little to say about the title track, which by now you'll have heard endlessly blaring on the radio. Fans of the lady Madonna will no doubt be delighted with her electro-pop embellishments (a la "Music"), but ultimately this is nothing new for the artiste, and as a high profile release it's disappointing. Somewhere amongst the samples and beeps there's a quality string riff trying to get out, but it's drowning beneath the banal lyrics, techno distortions and unnecessary manipulation. Some have argued that "it grows on you" but in this case it really is a matter of familiarity breeding contempt. If only the producers recognized that the best Bond songs are those written by the main composer. As Arnold proved with Tomorrow Never Dies' "Surrender" (far better than Sheryl Crow's song) and Garbage's The World is not Enough, his themes are strong enough to carry the film from beginning to end.

The title of second track, "Bond Vs Oakenfold," says it all. It's an egotistical re-working of the Bond theme, that's as useless as his re-working of Elfman's Planet of the Apes. Moby's Bond remix on Tomorrow Never Dies was more original in its approach, so what did they expect Oakenfold to add? In a score that already uses the Monty Norman theme as aspringboard for several cues, what value is there in bringing in another less accomplished variation?

Okay, the ranting is out of the way. Luckily, there's still nearly 47 minutes of score that more than warrant you buying this album. Just program out the first two cuts and kick off with "On the Beach." This is the first part of the pre-credits sequence and serves as a link from the classic "Bond in the gun barrel" intro to the landing in Korea. Greater use is made of snippets of Norman's Bond signature in these initial tracks than anywhere else in the score, thus authenticating the soundtrack for those looking for the established sound/ continuity. However, having "identified" the movie, Arnold swiftly develops his own voice by teasing in the copper-stringed Korean Yanggeum and a few bars of the main action motif. "Hovercraft Chase" is a pounding all-out action cue featuring innovative sampling.

"Some Kind of Hero?" tackles an emotional Bond coming out of months of torture. He feels betrayed by his superiors, and there's a sense of unease permeating the percussive music. Juxtapose that with the next track "Welcome to Cuba," a fun, frivolous Latino salsa piece that exists purely to add flavor to the foreign location, and harks back to previous Bond scores that have used local instruments to create a sense of place (Live and Let Die, You Only Live Twice, etc). In "Icarus," London Voices add some soaring Carmina Burana-esque chorals for the majestic moment when the deadly weapon is unfurled. Oh, and make sure you turn down the treble when hitting "Iced, inc." which follows Bond's car spinning frantically round on the ice. The electronic overlay has piercing slashes of sound that emulate the shards of ice spraying up from the frozen lake.

"Antonov" is the killer cue of the album, and as Arnold stresses in our interview, is a combination of all melody threads and minor anthems developed up to that point. It underscores the finale that takes place aboard the Antanov aircraft carrier, while the villain is starting to obliterate the earth below, and as such it's a an apocalyptic piece with echoes of his "destruction" music from Independence Day. It's one of those tracks that's punctuated with so many different sounds that you're dying to see what's happening on-screen. Why does (regular Arnold collaborator) Natacha Atlas' ethnic chanting come in at that place, and what's with the frantic piano/glockenspiel or the bamboo Shakuhatchi flute? Only a viewing of the movie will tell. And just to round things off, and bring the score full circle back to Barry-ville, "Going Down Together" is a witty romantic tribute to "The Guv'nor" that proves Bond will indeed have to die another day. Today, he's got the girl.

Over the last three years David Arnold's has steered away from blockbuster material, and focused on smaller pictures like John Singleton's Baby Boy, the funky Shaft, disturbing Changing Lanes and J-Lo vehicle Enough. The pessimists suggested that he had abandoned his "wall-to-wall" music sensibilities, but this is not the case at all. In fact, it just proves how versatile he is -- the jump from Enough to Die another Day is massive in terms of approach and structure. While the composer stresses that the movie is edited to give it the edge of a modern thriller like Bruckheimer's recent productions, this is a far more soulful score than any of the Media Ventures guys have added to those films.

The enhanced features are Madonna's video for the song (lots of torture and fencing), a "making of" featurette for the video, galleries of movie posters and Bond girls and links to other websites.

For all my initial quibbles, please do buy this album, and grab another copy for a friend. Hopefully, if it sells enough copies, we'll be able to convince some enterprising label to release an expanded score with the missing 60 minutes.
 
 
 
 
 
 

The James Bond Collection ***

BARRY, NORMAN, ARNOLD, CONTI, ETC

Prime Time (Silva Screen) TVPMCD 808

Disc One: 14 tracks - 45:10
Disc Two: 12 tracks - 48:31
Disc Three: 14 tracks - 56:05
Disc Four: 14 tracks - 54:11

I'm sure you let out a loud groan when you read that Silva was releasing a four-disc compilation of its James Bond cover versions; as franchises go, James Bond music is hardly under-represented in the market. For starters, there's the whole catalogue of EMI original soundtrack albums and the continually re-issued Capitol song compilation that adds the main song to the preceding Bond film to its track listing each time a successor is released. Then there are the countless efforts of never-before-heard orchestras and players who are not brave enough to put a spin on the themes (unlike David Arnold's "Shaken and Stirred" concept album) but would rather try to mimic the originals as closely as possible, hoping that no-one will notice. Witness the efforts by, amongst others, Sounds Orchestral (sounds awful!), The London Theatre Orchestra, The Secret Service Orchestra and The Moneypenny Singers. Add to the already saturated market the three previous Bond compilations by Silva (The Essential James Bond and Bond Back in Action volumes 1 and 2) and you'll see why this new release had the odds stacked against it.

Pre-conceptions aside, what does this deliver? Well, apart from Die Another Day, this four-disc set does comprehensively (and chronologically) cover the entire Bond series, and correctly ignores the non-canon Casino Royale and Never Say Never Again. Nic Raine again conducts the omnipresent City of Prague Philharmonic, and it's worth noting that he actually orchestrated Barry's scores to A View to a Kill and The Living Daylights. So, while these aren't original recordings, Raine does at least add a certain authenticity and cache. Twanging guitars, brass flourishes, ethnic instrumentation and heroic underscore -- it must be Bond.

As you'd expect, the '60s and '70s Barry tracks come off best, with the cheesier non-Barry material less successful. Monty Norman's Calypso-inspired Dr. No is still an acquired taste, so thank goodness for Barry's From Russia with Love, which sets the benchmark for all ensuing scores. There's some great Oriental percussion on You Only Live Twice's "The Wedding," which segues into an all-time favorite "Capsule in Space." Disc 3 is the weakest, being hampered with Bill Conti's For Your Eyes Only and Hamlisch's The Spy who Loved Me, which sounds like it's initially performed by a string quartet and lounge piano. Michael Kamen's Licence to Kill suffers from some OTT sax intrusion, and the Goldeneye instrumental really longs for Tina Turner's vocals and could do without brief bursts of that electric guitar. The version of Arnold's "Surrender" from Tomorrow Never Dies prompted the composer to say "well done" on the press notes, though The World Is Not Enough is more faithful to the source.

The golden cardboard presentation pack is neat too, with liner notes providing brief details of each movie and essential credits (villains, director, composer, etc.) Those with the Bond Back in Action discs will find little new, but for the novice it's a great way to build a library of symphonic action cues. Of course it's no substitute for the original recordings, but these are crisp re-recordings and in sharp contrast to some of the hissy older Barry soundtracks currently on the shelves. And at least you get a recording of John Altman's "Tank Drive" from Goldeneye, which is not commercially available apart from this Silva version.
 

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